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PRESENTED BY j 



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THE 

PITTS STREET CHAPEL LECTURE, 

IN ANSWER TO THE QUESTION, 

" WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN." 

BY THE 

RT. REV. GEO. M. RANDALL, D.D., 

BISHOP OF COLORADO. 



140TII THOUSAND. 



NEW YORK: 
E. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY, 
31 West 23d Street. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



THE 



PITTS STREET CHAPEL 
LECTUEE, 

IN ANSWER TO THE QUESTION. 

''WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN." 

BY THE 

RT. REY. GEO. M. RANDALL, D. D., 

BISHOP OP COLORADO. 



Efe ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason 
of the hope that is in you. — 1 Peter iii.. 15. 



NEW YORK 
E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 
31 West 23D Street 
1887 



Entered, according to Act ot Congress, in the year 1858, by 
i/ohit P Jewett and Company, 
the Clerk's Ofltee of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



(Kft 



PEEFACE. 



The occasion of the delivery o£ this Lecture was on 
this wise : — 

An association connected with the " Pitts Street 
Chapel," (a Unitarian place of worship, in this city,) 
invited clergymen from six denominations to preach a 
course of sermons, last winter, in defence of the distinc- 
tive principles of the religious bodies which they repre- 
sented. Having been requested to deliver one of that 
course, I accepted the invitation ; and in this Lecture, 
stated the reasons Why I am a Churchman. 

Some have expressed sr doubt, whether it were precisely 
becoming in a Church Minister to engage in what, to their 
eye, appeared to be an Ecclesiastical tournament. 

In this course of Lectures, there was neither union nor 
controversy. Hence there was neither compromising nor 
fighting, on the part of the preachers. On the Sunday 
evening assigned to me, the pulpit was mine, exclusively, 
for the time being. I had been invited to defend the 
faith and practice of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and 
I was expected to do this as fully and as forcibly as I 
would do, or could do, in my own parish Church. There 
was to be no delicacy of feeling, nor embarrassment of 
utterance, arising from the fact that I stood in another 
man's pulpit, and was addressing a congregation, a very 
large majority of wnom were not Episcopalians. 

Here was an opportunity for the Episcopal Church to 
\&k q a hearing, such as she never before had in New Eng- 
land. "We were challenged to tell our story, as plainly as 
we pleased, in the open ears of a multitude, who never 

(3) 



4 



PREFACE. 



before heard the Church argument, and who were willing 
to sit and listen to it, patiently and respectfully. Shall 
this opportunity be improved ? Shall the Churcn be heard 
in the heart of New England ? To my mind, there never 
was the shadow of a doubt, as to the course which I 
ought to take. I believed it to be not only right, to ac- 
cept the invitation and plead for the Church, but a bounden 
duty, which I was not at liberty to decline. 

The results of that humble effort, which have already 
come to my knowledge, have confirmed the conviction, 
that in delivering this Lecture, I acted the part of a con- 
sistent Churchman, and a faithful soldier and servant of 
Christ. 

This Lecture was first published in a volume, in con- 
nection with the other Lectures of the course. To such 
a publication, grave objections have been urged. On the 
other hand it is to be remembered, as a matter of com- 
pensation, that thirteen thousand copies of this book have 
already been published. At least ten thousand of these 
have gone into the hands of persons who are not Church- 
men. On the supposition that each copy has been read 
by ten persons, we have this result : one hundred thousand 
persons have read the Church argument who never read it 
before, and who, but for this volume, might never have 
read it at all. Moreover, these volumes are still in circu- 
lation, and will be more or less read every day, for years 
to come, while new editions will undoubtedly be issued. 
There is surely some advantage "in this, the fruits of 
which the Church will, no doubt, ultimately reap. 

This Lecture is now issued by itself, in a tract form, in 
the hope that, with the blessing of God, it may be the 
means of some good. 

G. M. R. 

Boston, 1858. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



THUS SAITH THE LORD, STAND YE IN THE WAYS, AND SEE, 
AND ASK FOR THE OLD PATHS. — Jer, vi. 16. 

THE CHURCH OF THE LIVING GOD, THE PILLAR AND GROUND 
OF THE TRUTH. — 1 Tim. iii. 15. 

HOLD FAST THE FORM OF SOUND WORDS. - 2 Tim. i. 13. 

The object of this discourse is to indicate 
the distinctive principles of the Protestant 
Episcopal Church. The enunciation of these 
is a sufficient answer to the question : Why 
I am a Churchman, — and cannot preach 
the Gospel in any other ecclesiastical organ- 
ization. 

There is, and since the days of Abraham, 
there ever has been, such a thing, on the 
earth, as the Church of God. He origin- 
ated it, — He governs and protects it. It is 
His instrumentality for the reformation, — 
the regeneration and the salvation of a fallen 
world. It is that Kingdom which Christ has 

5* (5) 



6 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

promised to be with, to the end of time, and 
against which the gates of hell shall never 
prevail. God wrote its constitution, ap- 
pointed and commissioned its officers. As 
man did not originate this organization, so 
he can neither abrogate nor modify it. He 
can neither establish the terms of admission 
nor clothe its rulers with power. If, then, 
the Church in its origin and authority is in 
no sense human, — and is in every sense di- 
vine, — we must look for its features, in the 
only book, where God has written out His 
will, touching the salvation of men. That 
Book is the Bible. Here, if any where, 
must we find the charter of the Church. 
Here the boundaries of this great kingdom 
are defined. Here the titles and functions 
of its officers, their authority and their 
duties, are declared. 

The world is divided into two great classes : 
chose who are within this Kingdom, and those 
who are without it. There is no neutrality 
in the great contest between a righteous God 
and a rebellious world. Every man is either 
an adopted citizen in this great common- 
wealth of grace, or he is an alien. " He 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



7 



that is not with me is against me," is the 
declaration of Christ. 

The lines which mark the boundaries of 
God's Kingdom have been drawn by His own 
finger, for the darkened eye of the. sinner. 
This fact, of itself, is sufficient to warrant 
the conclusion, that this demarcation is so 
distinct and definite, that " the wayfaring 
man, though a fool, need not err therein," 
and " he that runs may read." The Church 
then is God's Kingdom on earth, protected 
and preserved by the abiding power of His 
own promised presence, and may be as read- 
ily recognized by the description contained 
in the Scriptures, as any earthly kingdom 
may be known by its Constitution and 
Statute Book. If there be " no other name 
given among men, whereby we must be 
saved," but the name of Christ, and the 
Church is " Christ's mystical body," then it 
follows, that the sinner must know where y 
as well as how, to look for refuge from the 
power and penalty of sin. He is not to be 
sent in search of an invisible ark. 

The Israelites knew when they crossed the 
line, and entered " the promised land." The 



8 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



penitent prodigal knew when his father kissed 
him, and when his trembling feet crossed the 
threshold of that father's house. 

God made a covenant with Abraham, and 
with his seed, and with nobody else. This 
covenant was simple. The seal was definite. 
The conditions were explicit. All who re- 
ceived the seal were thereby made parties to 
the covenant. All who were in the covenant 
were in the Church, and all who were out of 
the covenant were out of the Church. From 
Abraham to Christ, no person could mistake 
the Church of God. No intelligent man 
could be at a loss where to find this divinely- 
ordained society. 

From Moses to John, it was equally plain 
who were the administrators of this Kingdom ; 
by whom appointed — their authority and 
their functions. 

God chose the tribe of Levi as the minis- 
terial tribe. Of them, He took the family of 
Aaron, as the priestly family ; of these, He 
selected one for the high priesthood. Thus 
was the Church of Jehovah furnished with a 
ministry, whose authority came with the 
great seal of heaven. And although this 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 9 



priesthood did not always please a Holy God, 
yet no other class of men, however learned 
or godly, were permitted to perform their 
sacred duties.* Thus were the people saved 
from all confusion in their inquiries for 
the Church, and for the divinely-ordained 
men, who, alone, were empowered to offer 
sacrifices in behalf of the people, and to 
teach them the way of life. 

In the fulness of time, God Himself de- 
scended from His throne to His footstool. 
Here He lived as a man among men. " He 
came not to destroy, but to fulfil." His 
mission was to complete the plan of redemp- 
tion. It was no part of His gracious errand 
to abrogate His own Church. There never 
had been, and there never was to be, more 
than one Church. 

" He brought life and immortality to 
light ; " fulfilled prophecy ; became the im- 
bodiment of all types and figures ; put an 
end to all sacrifices by the sacrifice of Him- 
self. He changed the seal, but left the cov- 
enant itself untouched. The " tree " which 
He had planted remained, though " the nat* 

* Numbers xvi. 



10 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



ural branches were broken off," and the 
branches of " the wild olive tree were graffed 
in."* 

The Jewish Church had the Scriptures, — ■ 
the Priesthood and the Ordinances. By these 
it was every where and by all known as " the 
Church of the living God." 

In Christ the Levitical Priesthood found 
its complement. In Him that Priesthood 
ended, and with it, the sacrificial services of 
the Temple. 

Prom Christ, the Great High Priest, went 
forth the Gospel, and from Him went forth 
the commission to men to preach it, and to 
administer its ordinances. There was no 
break in the great chain of grace. The cov- 
enant continued as in the beginning. The 
old Church was not pulled down that a new 
one might be built up. The Kingdom of 
Christ was to be known, as the Mosaic Church 
was known : by the Word, — the Ministry and 
the Ordinances. Wherever these were, there 
was " the Church of the living God, the pil- 
lar and ground of the Truth." If the dark 
line of the " Law " was sufficiently distinct, 

* Rom. xi. 17-24. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 11 



to mark the pale of the Jewish Church, much 
more clearly would the bright borders of 
Christ's Kingdom be defined, by the shining 
of the Sun of Righteousness. It would, in- 
deed, be most extraordinary, if the Church 
of Christ should be invisible, " when the 
darkness was past " and the " True Light " 
was now shining in all its uneclipsed splen- 
dor.* If there were certain infallible marks, 
by which the Legal Church was to be identi- 
fied, it would be more than marvellous if 
there were not marks equally infallible, by 
which errilig men might unerringly distin- 
guish the Gospel Church, from every form of 
human society. 

Christ appointed and sent forth twelve 
men, whom He denominated His Apostles, 
— as the Chief Ministers in His Church ; in- 
vesting them with authority to preach His 
Gospel, administer the Sacraments, and ex- 
ercise discipline, in His Kingdom. He, more- 
over authorized them to send others, in His 
name, with like powers. He also sent forth 
the " Seventy" to preach His Word.f Here, 

* One "field," Matt, xiii., 24-30; One "net," 47, 48. 
f Luke x. 1. 



12 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



then, as under the Old Dispensation, we find 
three grades of the Ministry : Christ, the 
Apostles, and the Elders or the " Seventy" 
On the night of the Saviour's betrayal, He 
instituted the Sacrament of the Lord's Sup- 
per. Just before His ascension, He gave to 
His Apostles their great commission, " to go 
into all the world and preach the Gospel to 
every creature, baptizing them in the name 
of the Holy Trinity." * Their authority to 
go, and to send others, came to them in these 
words which constituted a commission that 
can never expire, until the Church has done 
its work in the conversion of the world : 
" As my Father hath sent me, even so send 1 
you" f 

Christ did not call His Disciples together 
and organize them into a Church, and then 
direct and empower them to elect and ordain 
their own ministers. He did not do thus, be- 
cause these ministers were His ministers — 
the ministers of God ; and their successors, 
to the end of the world, were to be His min- 
isters, deriving all their power and authority 
as such from Him, and from Him alone. In 



* Matt, xxviii. 18, 19, 20. 



f John xx. 21. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



13 



accordance with this commission, the Apos- 
tles, soon after the ascension of the Saviour, 
proceeded to ordain a class of ministers, 
called Deacons, whom they empowered to 
preach and baptize.* Here again appears 
the threefold ministry : Apostles, Presby- 
ters, and Deacons. Why God saw fit to have 
High Priests, Priests and Levites in the 
Jewish Church, it is not for us to say. It 
might have pleased Him to appoint one 
order;, and in that case, one order would 
have been enough. But for wise reasons He 
saw fit to have three, and therefore neither 
one order nor two orders would have an- 
swered the end of the Priesthood. This 
matter of the Threefold Priesthood was not 
a notion of Moses, but a fiat of God. Why 
Christ saw fit to establish a similar numeri- 
cal distinction in the ministry of the Church, 
I do not know. All we know about it is the 
fact, and that is all we need to know. 

The Saviour was on the earth for the 
space of forty days after His resurrection 
and before His ascension. During this 
period, He instructed His inspired Apostles 

* Acts vi. 3-6 ; viii. 5, 12, 38. 1 Tim. iii. 8, 10-13, 

2 



14 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



in matters pertaining to His Kingdom. 
Christ promised that the Comforter, whom 
He should send, which was the Holy Ghost, 
would teach them all things.* He told them 
to remain in Jerusalem until they had re- 
ceived the baptism of the Holy Ghost. f On 
the day of Pentecost, the Spirit was poured 
out upon them. J While they were yet in- 
spired with the Holy Ghost, and so were 
taught by it, they ordained men to the third 
or lowest order of the ministry. § This dis- 
tinction was, therefore, not a mere fancy of 
the Apostles. It was the' revealed mind of 
the Great Head of the Church, in beautiful 
harmony with the mind of the unchangeable 
God, as it had been heard and heeded by 
"Moses and the prophets." For aught we 
know, one order of the ministry in the 
Christian Church might have been as good 
as three, and it certainly would have been 
as good, if Christ had seen fit so to ordain. 
But He was pleased to appoint three orders, 
and therefore neither one nor two are or can 
be sufficient. 

It is to be observed, that all this occurs 

* John xiv. 26. f Acts i. 4, 5. % Acts ii. § Acts vi. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 15 

before the New Testament was written, and 
before the Christian Church had any organi- 
zation, except in its ministry. The ministry 
had its mission and its commission from 
Christ, before the Church had any organic 
form whatever. 

Here was the Church of Christ: a king- 
dom on earth; a visible kingdom among 
men ; for here was the Word : the written 
Word of the Old Testament, and the unwrit- 
ten Word of the New Testament. Here were 
the Sacraments, and here was the Ministry. 
This was the Christian Church, and nothing 
else was. None mistook it ; none could mis- 
take it. The believers readily recognized it, 
and entered it ; and the enemies of God had 
no difficulty in finding it, that they might 
persecute it. Here was a Christian ministry 
with their commissions fresh from God. 
Here was the seal of the covenant, direct 
from the hand of Christ. Here, then, was 
the line drawn by the finger of God, around 
the Kingdom of his Son, that marked, with 
living light, the boundaries which separated 
it from the kingdom of darkness, and from 
all organizations of men, for all future ages. 



16 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN, 

The hand of the Almighty wrote over " the 
narrow gate " of that Kingdom, in letters 
bright and bold enough to be read of all 
men, this sentence : " Except a man be born, 
of water, and of the Spirit, he cannot enter 
into the kingdom of God." * This language 
is sufficiently plain, and exclusive, and un- 
compromising, to mark the perpetual distinc- 
tion between the Church and the world. 
That these three orders were to be continued 
in the Church, and were to constitute the 
Christian ministry for all time to come, and 
were to go hand in hand with the Word 
and the Sacraments, thereby identifying the 
Christian Church throughout the earth, is 
evident from the history of the Church, in 
the apostolic age. 

The original number of the twelve apos- 
tles was made good by the appointment of 
Matthias in place of Judas, f The objection 
that the office of an apostle was a temporary 
one, instituted solely for the work of laying the 
foundation of the Church, and was therefore 
confined to the twelve, is effectually silenced 
by the fact, that others were added to this 

* John iii. 5. f Acts i. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 17 

number, and that too, before the canon of 
the New Testament was completed. Thus 
the miraculous conversion oPSt. Paul, and 
his appointment to the first order of the 
ministry immediately, by Christ himself, 
proves, conclusively, that the Order of the 
Apostles was not to be limited to the college 
of the twelve, since he was the thirteenth 
Apostle. Barnabas was also set apart to the 
work of an Apostle, and he made the four- 
teenth. And although one qualification of 
the first Apostles was, that they should have 
seen the Lord Jesus Christ, and so be wit- 
nesses of His resurrection, which was of 
necessity confined to them as the Apostles, 
who were commissioned to lay the foundation 
of the Church, yet the power of their office 4 , 
the commission which they had received from 
Christ, was transmissible, and so others, by 
receiving it, would be admitted to the rank 
of an Apostle. Hence St. Paul ordained 
Titus to the office of an Apostle, although 
he had never seen Christ, and was not, there- 
fore, a witness of His resurrection, and as 
such, empowered him to ordain elders in 
2* 



18 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



every city.* He moreover consecrated Tim- 
othy to the apostleship, and the churches in 
Ephesus were placed in his charge. f These 
Apostles, thus ordained and " sent," had the 
power to ordain and send forth others, clothed 
with the like office and ministry. Their 
commission included, of course, the power 
to ordain men to the second and third orders. 
All this is a matter of New Testament rec- 
ord. In the succeeding age, as we learn 
from ecclesiastical history, wherever the Gos- 
pel was preached, there was found this three- 
fold Ministry, with the Word and the Sacra- 
ments ; and the Christian Church appears in 
no other form. 

In the New Testament, the word " Bish- 
op," which means an " overseer" is applied 
to the second order of the ministry, inter- 
changeably with the word, " presbyter" 
Very soon after the death of the first apos- 
tles, this title, " Bishop" was applied to the 
order of the Apostles, or the highest grade 
of the ministry, leaving the original title of 
Apostle to designate those, who were eye- 
witnesses of Christ's resurrection. Within 

* Titus i. 5. f ^ T o*e A. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 19 

ten years after the death of St. John, who 
died A. D. 100, the three orders of the mim 
istry were designated bishops, priests, and 
deacons. Ignatius, who was a disciple of 
St. John, and who was made Bishop of 
Antioch by apostles then living, and who 
sealed his faith in the blood of martyrdom in 
less than ten years after the death of St. 
John, thus speaks : " Attend to the bishop, 
and to the presbytery, and to the deacons." * 
The Church rapidly spread in Asia, Africa, 
and Europe. St. Thomas travelled as far east 
as India. St. Mark preached in Egypt, and 
founded the Church at Alexandria. St. Pe- 
ter carried the Gospel to various parts of 
Asia, and may have visited Rome. St. Paul 
not only preached the Gospel in Greece, and 
Rome, and Spain, but it is believed that he 
planted the standard of the Cross in the 
Island of Britain. During the first three 
centuries, the Church grew rapidly, and 
continued comparatively pure. Wherever 
found, and by whatever people embraced, it 
had the "Word, the Sacraments, and the three- 
fold Ministry, with its commission, claiming 

* Wakes. Ig. pp. 218, 219, 227. 



20 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



to have the seal of the Apostles. By these 
divine credentials it was every where recog- 
nized and submitted to, as " the Church of 
the living God — the pillar and ground of 
the truth." Such were the distinctive fea- 
tures of this kingdom, that no one who was 
looking for it, could possibly mistake it ; and 
no considerable body of men had, as yet, the 
presumption to put asunder what Christ had 
joined together. 

After the conversion of the Emperor Con- 
stantine, in the fourth century, the Church 
began to receive the smiles of the world, and 
the patronage of the state, and then it began 
to decline in godliness. 

Thus far each Church had its own bishop, 
and these were essentially independent of 
each other. The Churches in Asia, Africa, 
Gaul, Spain, and Britain, were on an equali- 
ty, and all of them were independent of 
Rome. The Bishop of Rome met other bish- 
ops of the Church in councils, without having 
or claiming any superiority. It was not 
until the seventh century, that the Bishop 
of Rome, having stealthily assumed powers 
that did not belong to him, was acknowl- 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



21 



edged by the Western Churches as supreme, 
and not even then without sharp opposition. 

The papal supremacy was then, and has 
ever since been rejected by the Greek and 
Oriental Churches. Henceforth there was a 
great division in the Christian Church. Asia 
and the east of Europe, including Greece, 
and the north-eastern part of Africa were on 
the one side, and known as the Greek 
Church ; and Europe, from Austria west- 
ward, was on the other side, and known as 
the Latin Church. 

The Church of England was founded, 
probably, in the Apostolic Age, and, it is 
said, by the labors of St. Paul. In common 
with other churches it maintained its inde- 
pendence of the Church of Rome, for more 
than five centuries. It had the Word, the 
Sacraments, and the threefold Ministry ; 
Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. It derived 
the succession, not from the Church of Rome, 
but from the Apostles, through the Bishops 
of Aries and Lyons, and the Asiatic Bishops. 

The British Church thus continued, until 
the time of the Saxon invasion. After that 
event, the Romish Church, in A. D. 596, 



22 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

sent Augustine, with a company of Mission- 
aries, to that Island. The efforts of these 
Eomans were so far successful, that while 
the heathen Saxons were converted to Chris- 
tianity, the British Church herself was grad- 
ually brought under the domination of the 
Romish hierarchy. 

When Augustine landed, he found the 
queen an avowed Christian. He found, 
moreover, a Church fully organized, with 
an Archbishop and seven Bishops. As early 
as A. D. 400 or 420, a synod of British 
Christians was held at Verulam, for the 
purpose of checking the heresy of Pelagius. 
At the Council of Aries, held in A. D. 314, 
there were present British Bishops. At 
this time, there were three metropolitans in 
Britain, and this was two hundred years 
before there were any Roman missionaries 
on the Island. St. Alban, its proto-martyr, 
was put to death for his faith, during the 
persecution under Diocletian in A. D. 305. 
Almost three hundred years before Rome 
had a foothold in Britain, the British Church 
had not only her Bishops but her martyrs. 

Thus it is evident that the Church was 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



23 



fully established in England, and from a 
source entirely independent of Rome, nearly 
five hundred years before the Romish Church 
sent thither its emissaries. 

The shades of the night of the Middle 
Ages were now falling upon Christendom. 
The Pope's supremacy had finally, though 
reluctantly, been conceded by the Western 
Churches, and the successor of St. Peter was 
beginning to lord it over God's heritage. 
To the great credit of the English Church, 
it can be shown, that, during this dark 
period, there were leading men in that com- 
munion who made a bold stand, not only 
against the usurpations, but against the cor- 
ruptions of Popery. In A. D. 961, Arch- 
bishop Dunstan did not hesitate to set at de- 
fiance the papal mandate, when he deemed 
it unjust or improper. Alfric Pottock, Arch- 
bishop of York from 1023 to 1050, openly 
impugned the doctrine of teansubstantiation. 
" In the next century, Gilbert Foliat, conse- 
crated Bishop of Hereford in 1148, set at de- 
fiance the papal authority, aivd, though twice 
excommunicated by the Pope, paid no regard 
to the thunders of the Vatican." " Robert 



24 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



Grostete, or Greathead, Bishop of Lincoln 
from 1234 to 1258, visited Rome, and pro- 
tested against its corruptions before the Pope 
and Cardinals." He subsequently " set at 
naught the Pope's commands, for which he 
was excommunicated ; but the thunderbolt 
fell harmless at his feet, and he died in peace- 
ful possession of his See." * As late as the 
twelfth century the Irish Church refused to 
accede fully to the supremacy of the Pope, f 
For hundreds of years " there was dark- 
ness over the promised land" of Christendom, 
" and gross darkness covered " both ministry 
and people. Idolatry, superstition, unsound 
doctrines, and corrupt practices, every where 
prevailed. Yet this was still the Church of 
Christ. Just as the Jewish Church was the 
Church of God, while in a state of idolatrous 
rebellion. In our Saviour's time the minis- 
try of that Church had become exceedingly 
corrupt, yet He recognized t]iem as having 
divine authority, and after this manner coun- 
selled His disciples : " The Scribes and the 
Pharisees sit in Moses' seat; all, therefore, 
whatsoever they bid you observe, that ob« 

* Chapin, on the Primitive Church. f Note 0. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 25 



serve and do ; but do not ye after their 
works." * 

In the sixteenth century, the time, in 
God's good Providence, had come, when 
the Apostolic Church of England should 
arise, and, throwing off the papal yoke, 
again take her rightful place as a branch 
of the Universal Church of Christ. In do- 
ing this " she freed herself from the errors 
into which she had fallen." 

There was no new Church created at the 
Reformation. The English Church, by the 
help of her divine Head, reformed herself. 
She did not thereby lose her identity, much 
less her Apostolic existence. " The errors 
of, the Church were not the Church herself, 
and in quitting them she did not quit herself, 
any more than a man changes his face when 
he washes it, or loses his identity when he 
recovers from a disease. The English Church 
after the Reformation was as much the Eng- 
lish Church, as Naaman was Naaman after he 
had washed away his leprosy in the River 
Jordan." During all this period of dark- 
ness and corruption, the Church of England 

* Matt, xxiii. 1, 2. 

3 



26 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



did not lose her visibility nor her identity 
" Job was visibly and verily Job, when he 
was covered with sores. So was the Church 
in Britain visible in the darkest hour of that 
black midnight of ages. She was visible in 
her Churches, in her ordained Ministers, in 
the Holy Sacraments, the Holy Scriptures." 
She shone forth in the flames of her martyrs, 
who suffered for the truth. 

The rule of reformation which she followed 
was this : to reject whatever of doctrine was 
unscriptural, and whatever of usages were 
contrary to the practice of the Church in the 
first and purest ages. She simply threw off 
what Popery had superadded to the faitK 
The great difference between the reformation 
in England and the reformation on the Con- 
tinent was this : the English Church rejected 
nothing, simply because the Eomish Church 
held or practised it, for the reason that this, 
of itself, did not make a doctrine or a cere- 
mony wrong. Hence, she retained the min- 
istry in the three orders, of Bishops, Priests, 
and Deacons, a liturgical service, clerical 
vestments, and other minor matters, none of 
which were the fruits of the papacy. It is 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 27 

very true, Rome had abused the office of a 
Bishop, but that was no good reason for re- 
jecting what the Apostles had established. 
So Rome had more than abused the Sacra- 
ment of the Lord's Supper, not only by with- 
holding the cup from the laity, but by de- 
grading that divine Ordinance of Christ, into 
an act of absolute idolatry ; yet that most 
abominable abuse would not justify the re- 
jection of the Sacrament altogether. There 
were some things which the English Church 
held, and still hold, in common with the Ro- 
man Church, for the good reason that these 
things were held by the Church in the Apos- 
tolic age. On the contrary, the Reformers 
on the Continent were not content to exscind 
simply what was corrupt, but in their zeal 
they cut off what was Apostolic. They re- 
jected Episcopacy, because the Bishop of 
Rome was a Pope. As well might they have 
rejected the Bible and the Lord's Supper. 

The multitude of sects, which subsequently 
sprang up, carried this unlicensed liberty to 
still greater extremes. There were the " In- 
dependents," who not only rejected Episco- 
pacy, but Presbyterianism also, and so refused 



28 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



all ministry that pretended to an Apostolic 
commission, and accepted such only, as the 
congregation should make for themselves ; 
hence they were called " Congregational- 
ists" Then there were the Quakers, who 
rejected not only the ministry, but the Sacra- 
ments. 

The Puritans, who would not tolerate 
either the Episcopacy of England or the 
Presbyterianism of Geneva, and who felt 
aggrieved at the union of Church and State, 
in consequence of their sufferings as dissen- 
ters, emigrated to this country in search of 
that liberty which they could not enjoy at 
home. They had hardly placed their feet 
on Plymouth Rock, ere they formed a State 
and joined it to the Church, so that the co- 
lonial daughter, in her infancy, rivalled her 
venerable mother in the tenacity with which 
she cherished the unnatural wedlock of 
u Church and State." Nor was she very 
much behind her queenly matron in the zeal 
with which she maintained the supremacy 
of her established religion, as Quakers, Bap- 
tists, and Churchmen could feelingly attest. 

The members of the Church of England 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



29 



in the colonies were comparatively few. 
Nevertheless, several parishes were organ- 
ized in New England, and in New York and 
Virginia. In Massachusetts, Churchmen felt 
the fires of persecution, which Puritan hands 
had lighted on the shores of the new world. 
Among other enactments, it was made a 
penal offence for any person to observe 
the festival of Christmas by a religious ser- 
vice ; so that if a Churchman should sing a 
Fsalm of Praise to God, in this city of Bos- 
ton, in commemoration of the birth of 
Christ, he would be liable to be thrust into 
a dungeon.* ' 

Episcopal clergymen were sent over from 
England and chiefly maintained by Mission- 
ary Societies in the English Church. The 
parishes here were, nominally, under the 
care of the Bishop of London. When the 
colonies declared their independence of the 
mother country, then there was a necessary 
abrogation of the ecclesiastical relations, 
which the Episcopal Church here sustained 
to the Church of England. 

In the year 1784, the Rev. Samuel Sea- 

* Note B 



30 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



bury was elected to the office of Bishop, by 
the clergy of Connecticut, and was conse- 
crated by certain Bishops in Scotland. The 
Rev. William White of Pennsylvania, Rev. 
Samuel Provost of New York, and the Rev. 
James Madison of Virginia, were consecrated 
Bishops in England ; the first two in 1787, 
and the last named in 1790. The organiza- 
tion of the Episcopal Church in the United 
States was very soon completed. And here 
were the Word, the Sacraments, and the 
Ministry, in the three orders of Bishops, 
Priests, and Deacons, in an unbroken suc- 
cession, from the Apostles. This divine 
commission has thus come down to us from 
Christ. It has to-day just the same fresh- 
ness and authority, that it had, when St. 
Paul ordained Titus with power to ordain 
others in like manner. 

The Bishops of the American Church can 
trace their ecclesiastical lineage through 
Archbishop Sheldon, up through the old 
English, Italian, and Irish Episcopate, to the 
Apostolic Age. 

The Protestant Episcopal Church in the 
United States claims thus to be a branch of 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. Si 



" the Church of the Living God, the pillar 
and ground of the truth." 

The Church of Christ, all admit, is an 
entity ; — it is some where, and must be 
known by some thing. Where is it, and what 
are the signs of it ? I answer : It is to be 
found wherever the Word, the Ministry, and 
the Sacraments are found. However it may 
be with others, for whom we do not speak, 
we claim to have these three. The Church 
of Christ, which " He bought with His 
blood," which He has promised to be with, 
to the end of the world, is not just what 
wicked or even -pious men choose to make 
it : — one thing in one place, and a totally 
different thing in another place. The 
Church is like its Divine Head in the es- 
sential qualities of its being: "the same 
yesterday, to-day, and forever." There are 
men who reject the Bible, — they don't be- 
lieve the Word of God. . Are they the 
Church ? There are others who reject the 
Sacraments. They recognize no covenant, 
and so repudiate the seal of it. Are they 
the Church ? There are men who scout the 
divinity of Christ, laugh at His Miracles, and 



32 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

talk of the coming of better men than He. 
Are they the Church ? There are others 
who do not believe in any ministry. Are 
they the Church of Christ ? Others pretend 
to have a revelation of their own, superior 
to the Bible — the followers of Mahommed, 
Swedenborg, Anne Lee, and Smith, with 
revelations as contradictory to each other, as 
they all are contradictory to the Word of 
God. Are they the Church of God's only 
Son? 

r here is the latest spiritual swindle, which 
has turned the minds of men till they are 
made to believe, that a man can have abetter 
book than the Bible, rapped out for him at 
his own fireside. Are these people, who 
" seek unto them that have familiar spirits, 
and unto wizards that peep and that mutter," 
are they the Church of Christ ? 

Can it be that the Saviour, who knew what 
is in the human heart, and who foresaw in 
what eccentric forms man's depraved folly 
would develop itself, should place His Church 
in the world, as the exclusive instrumentality 
for the salvation of men, without any infal- 
lible marks, by which it might be distin- 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



33 



guished from all things human, and all 
things devilish ? Such an idea is preposter- 
ous. The world is as wicked, as rebellious, 
as curious, as inventive, as fond of change 
and of novelty now, as in the days of Moses 
and the Prophets, and as in the time of 
Christ and His Apostles. The marks of the 
Jewish Church were such, in that " wicked 
and adulterous generation," that nobody was 
in any danger of confounding that Church 
with any other organization. Would Christ 
make the marks of the Christian Church to 
be less distinct ? 

His Church is here, among men. It has 
been here more than eighteen hundred years, 
and it is to continue here, until the last great 
day. Amid the noise, and confusion, and 
conflict, which fill the world, as the off- 
spring of sin, this Church is to do its great 
work, and there will never be an hour when 
it may, not be identified as " the Church of 
the Living God, the pillar and ground of the 
truth." It may be known now, and for all 
ivime to come it will be known, as it has been 
known for more than eighteen centuries. 
"Wherever there is a congregation of faith> 



34 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



ful men, in the which the pure Word of God 
is preached, and the Sacraments be duly min- 
istered, according to Christ's ordinance, in 
all those things, that of necessity are requi- 
site to the same," * there is " the Church of 
the Living God, the pillar and ground of the 
truth." By whatever name it maybe known, 
or whoever may be its members, that organ- 
ization is the Church of Christ, as distin- 
guished from all devices of men. 

Do you ask how we may be sure of a min- 
istry of " unbroken succession," from the 
Apostles, holding and handing down their 
commission from Christ? I answer, — just 
as you are sure that this Bible has come 
down to us, " a true copy " of the original 
manuscript, written by the inspired pen of 
the Apostles. This Holy Bible, and this 
ministerial commission, have been transmitted 
by the same hands. They have both been 
guarded by that vigilance of the Church, in 
all ages, which warrants the confidence that 
is now, and ever has been, entertained by the 
faithful, every where, in the authenticity of 
that book, which we call the Bible. f 



* 19th Article. 



f Note C. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 35 

Is it objected, that this is an exclusive 
claim on the part of a comparatively small 
minority of Christendom? To this I an- 
swer:' that for fifteen hundred years from 
the Apostles, there was no other ministry 
in the Christian Church. Wherever the 
Church existed there were these three or- 
ders : Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, claim- 
ing to come from the Apostles. But it may 
be asked : What relation does Episcopacy 
bear to other forms of ministry, at the 
present time ? To this question I reply, 
that if it were in the minority, in point of 
numbers, that fact could by no possibility 
affect its claim to Apostolic authority. The 
popular will in a particular locality cannot 
change the principles of truth. Principles 
are not like politicians, made and unmade 
by a majority of voices. There are in the 
world, at the present time, about two hun- 
dred millions of people, who bear the Chris- 
tian name. Of these two hundred millions, 
one hundred and eighty millions acknowl- 
edge the authority of the Apostolic ministry, 
of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. It appears 
then, that at the present time, about four 



36 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



fifths of all Christendom retain the ministry 
as the Apostles established it, and as the 
whole Church retained it for fifteen hundred 
years. It may be objected, that such a view 
of the ministry is an acknowledgment, that 
the Romish and Greek communions have 
the Apostolic ministry, and are therefore 
Churches of Christ. We aver that they are 
Christian Churches, holding more or less of 
error. But their errors do not vitiate their 
Orders. Their abuse of the ministerial com- 
mission does not annihilate that commission. 
As I have already said, the Scribes and Phar- 
isees were so corrupt, in doctrine and in life, 
that the Saviour likened them " to whited 
sepulchres full of all uncleanness," and yet, 
in His day, they sat in Moses' seat, and by 
His command His disciples were required to 
recognize their divine commission, while they 
were to be careful to avoid the contamina- 
tion of their evil example. " Baalam was a 
wicked man, but a true Prophet." * " The 
Sons of Eli, bad as they were, ceased not to 
be Priests." f 

It may be asked, if our Protestant Priest- 

* Num. xxii to xxiv. »* Txxi. 16. f 1 Sam. iu 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 37 



hood is not indebted for its existence to a 
reformation brought about by Henry the 
VIII. to gratify his own evil passions ? Sup- 
pose we admit all this, what then ? " Henry 
was an agent in effecting this great work ; still 
the work-man is not the work. The Temple 
,of Solomon was constructed with cedars of 
Lebanon hewn by workmen of heathen Tyre. 
Jehu did not please God ; but his reforma- 
tion did. Nebuchadnezzar and Ahasuerus 
were idolatrous ; btft their edicts for 6od's 
service were religious. The Temple, in 
which our Lord was presented and in which 
He preached, and worshipped, had been re- 
paired by the impious and cruel Herod, who 
sought the Lord's life." * So in the matter 
of the Eeformation, the character of the 
agency did not affect the integrity of the 
work itself. . 

There are not a few among the less en- 
lightened of the community, who regard the 
Episcopal Church, whose distinctive princi- 
ples I am here to explain, as but a slight re- 
move from the Roman Catholic Church. 
While others, a little less bigoted, conde- 

* Theop. Americanus, p. 199. 

4 



38 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



scend to confess, that while ours is something 
of an improvement upon the papal commun- 
ion, yet we are the legitimate offspring of 
the " mistress of abominations," and carry 
the lineaments of the scarlet mother in our 
countenances quite too distinctly, to leave 
any doubt of our pedigree. In reply, we 
have only to say, that ours is a Protestant 
Church in the most comprehensive sense of 
that term. It did not originate from the pa- 
pal communion. It is no offspring of Rome. 
As I have already shown, the English Church 
had an existence five hundred years, before 
Roman Catholic missionaries visited the Isl- 
and of Great Britain. In the seventh cen- 
tury she was overcome by Popery ; and in 
the sixteenth century she threw off that yoke 
of papal bondage, and stood, where she stood 
before, an Apostolic Church, with a ministry 
which came to her from apostolic hands, 
through Bishops, who were not of Rome. 
So much as to the taint of parentage. 

In clearing herself of the corruptions of 
Romanism, at the Reformation, she uttered 
her perpetual " Protest " against the heresies 
of that church, in tones that made the Vatican 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 39 



tremble. The Episcopal Church, Romish ! 
I ask, who fought the battles of the English 
Reformation ? From whose ranks came forth, 
during this eventful period, that noble army 
of martyrs, who went to Heaven from the 
plains of Smithfield, in chariots of fire ? 
Who were the mighty men of that age of 
ecclesiastical revolution, whose lives and 
learning were consecrated to the work of ex- 
posing the unscriptural dogmas of Rome, 
whose strong hands were stretched forth to 
strip the pontifical robes from that graceless 
tyrant, who had so long and so effectually 
enslaved Christ's freemen ? Who were the 
bold preachers of that day, the men that 
" took their lives in their hands," and went 
forth to denounce the usurpations of priestly 
power, and the practice of the idolatrous 
rites of Romanism ? English Churchmen, 
every one of them ! The Episcopal Church, 
Romish ! I ask, the men who make this 
assertion, where do you borrow the weapons 
wherewith you assault Popery ? Whose ar- 
guments do you use, whose learning do you 
employ, whose books do you study, when you 
attack the Papacy ? Do not every one of 



40 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



you go to the armory, which the Old English 
Divines have so richly furnished, for every 
weapon you use against Romanism ? Can 
you bring forward a single strong Protestant 
argument, which is new, or which cannot be 
found in the writings of the champions of 
the Reformation in the Church of England ? 
If all this be so, why do these zealous boast- 
ers stultify themselves, by continually ringing 
changes upon that well worn saw of " Popery 
in Episcopacy " ? But more than this, I 
challenge any body of Christians to produce 
one tithe of the amount of printed standard 
authority for doctrines, which are anti-papal, 
as the Protestant Episcopal Church can show 
in her Prayer Book and Homilies. Until 
these accusers can do something like this, 
they should cease to make the charge of 
Romanism or Romish tendencies against our 
Church. 

But it is said that our ministers go to 
Rome. Admitting that such may have been 
the fact in some instances, what does it 
prove ? Does it show that ours is a school 
of Papacy ? No more than the treason of 
Judas proved that the college of the Apostles 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 41 

was a school of Apostasy. There are nearly 
twenty thousand Protestant Episcopal Cler- 
gymen in the English and American Episco- 
pal Churches ; and within the last ten years, 
there may have been among them one hun- 
dred defections to Rome. Take twenty 
thousand ministers of the other Protestant 
bodies in this country, if there be so many 
here, and see how many of this number have 
been displaced from the ministry, during the 
last ten years, for errors in doctrine and life. 
You will probably find two for every one 
that has gone to Rome, from the Episcopal 
Church ; and do you therefore conclude, 
that these respectable denominations are 
necessarily tending to infidelity and immo- 
rality ? 

There is another view of this matter, which 
should be taken. We get credit for conver- 
sions to Romanism, to which we are not 
entitled. A very large proportion of the de- 
fections to Popery, in the Episcopal Church 
in the United States, both of clergy and laity, 
are persons who have come into our fold 
from the various denominations around us. 

Many of them are fatally infected before they 
4* 



42 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



come among us. They stay long enough to 
break out with the loathsome disease, and 
then we, forsooth, get the name of having a 
" pest-house," and all godly people are warned 
to keep clear of the Churtfh, if they wish to 
preserve their faith in good health. It, how- 
ever, has happened, in many cases, that per- 
sons have gone direct to the Church of 
Rome, from the communions in which they 
have been reared, without taking the Episco- 
pal Church in their way. This has been the 
fact in this State. The converts to Popery, 
in Boston, for the last ten years, have repre- 
sented the Orthodox Congregationalist, the 
Baptist, and the Unitarian denominations. 

The protectant character of our commun- 
ion is seen in this, that when a man once 
becomes a papist, he cannot stay in it. He 
cannot teach its doctrines, nor use its prayers, 
nor enjoy its services. He is not at home. 
He " goes out from us because he is not of 
us," and like Judas, finds " his own place." 
We need no better witnesses of the thorough- 
ly protestant character of our Church, than 
the testimony of perverts to Rome. 

The Episcopal Church is protestant in 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



43 



another sense. The world, as it stands aloof 
from the Kingdom of Christ, is intelligent 
enough to perceive, that all the errors in 
Christendom are not clustered about the 
"Seven Hills"; that there are those who 
have departed from the faith, who do not 
wear the livery of the Vatican. 

The Episcopal Church assaults the faith 
of none. She makes no war upon the sys- 
tem of others. She is content with simply 
maintaining her own Apostolic standards, 
and in this unobtrusive manner, protesting 
against their multiform errors. She beholds 
the serried ranks of the Romans on the one 
hand, and the motley multitude of the con- 
flicting sects on the other. Of these sects, 
none are over three hundred years old, and 
many of them are much younger. Some of 
them came into being, within the memory 
of persons in this congregation. 

In respect to Church government, other 
Protestant bodies may be divided into three 
classes: Episcopal, Presbyterian, and Congre- 
gational. This last includes all who adopt 
that mode of church government ; embracing 
Baptists, Unitarians. Orthodox Congregation' 



44 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



alists, Universalists, a part of the Methodists, 
Quakers, Shakers, &c. 

The Methodists have an Episcopal form 
of government. Their ministry consists of 
Bishops, Elders, and Deacons ; but their 
Episcopacy only reaches to John Wesley ; 
whereas to be valid, it should reach to the 
Apostles. Mr. Wesley was a godly minister 
of the Church of England, at a time when 
pious preachers were not as numerous in that 
Church as they are now. His heart burned 
within him for a true revival of pure and 
undefiled religion, of which there was great 
need. God blessed his preaching. Multi- 
tudes became interested. These new con- 
verts were Church of England people, and 
their zealous devotion to the duties of reli- 
gion procured for them the soubriquet of 
Methodists ; a title first given to Mr. Wesley 
at the University of Oxford, by way of re- 
proach, for his exactness of life. Mr. Wesley 
never intended to be the founder of a sect. 
He says, at a meeting of their preachers in 
1744, " I exhorted them to keep to the 
Church ; observing that this was our pecu- 
liar glory ■ — not to form any new sect, buf 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



45 



abiding in our own Church, to do to all men 
all the good we possibly could." A strong 
sectarian spirit having manifested itself, and 
Mr. Wesley desiring to bring the matter to 
an issue, caused the question to be discussed, 
and it was finally decided, without a dissent- 
ing voice, that " It is by no means expedient 
that the Methodists should leave the Church 
of England." So strong was this feeling, 
that the following declaration was inserted 
in the first rules of their society : " they that 
leave the Church, leave us" " And this we 
did," says Mr. Wesley, " not as a point of 
prudence, but a point of conscience." In 
1789, two years before his death, he used 
these words : "I declare once more, that I 
live and die a member of the Church of 
England, and that none who regard my 
judgment or advice, will ever separate from 
it." " In his sermon, preached at Cork, 
about the same time, he declared to the 
preachers in his connection, that they had no 
right to baptize and administer the Sacra- 
ment of the Lord's Supper." His design 
was to improve the state of religion in the 
Church; and, as he said, he did not dare to 



46 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

leave the Church. " Mr. Wesley, when he 
was eighty years of age, in a private chamber 
of a public house in Bristol, England, was 
induced to lay his hands upon the head of the 
Eev. Dr. Coke, a Presbyter of the Church of 
England, appointing him as a superintendent 
over the missionary operations of the Meth- 
odists in America. On Dr. Coke's arrival 
in this country, he proceeded to lay his hands 
on the head of a Mr. Asbury, a layman, and 
thereby ordained him to the same office of 
superintendent. These two men soon began 
to call themselves Bishops. When Mr. Wes- 
ley heard of this, he immediately rebuked 
their arrogation of an office and title, which 
he never pretended to have conveyed. In 
a letter to Mr. Asbury, he says : ' How can 
you, hotv dare you suffer yourself to be elected 
a Bishop ? I shudder, I start at the very 
thought. For my sake, for God's sake, for 
Christ's sake, put an end to this.' " * This 
was the origin of Methodist Episcopacy. In 
the matter of the ministry, the Methodists 
have the " form, without the power." Mr. 
Wesley could not give to another what he 

* Ricnardson's " Reasons," &c. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



47 



had never received himself. Not being a 
Bishop he could not confer Episcopal powers 
on Dr. Coke, and never intended to confer 
any such power.* The Episcopal Church 
cannot, of course, recognize an Episcopacy 
originating with a Presbyter of the Church 
of England, as Apostolic, and therefore valid. 

The Presbyterians originated with John 
Calvin, at the Reformation.! They believe 
in one order of the ministry. They hold, as 
Episcopalians do, to the doctrine of an Apos- 
tolic succession, with this difference ; we ad- 
here to the three Orders, as they have come 
down from the Apostles ; they hold to the 
parity of the ministry, of which there is no 
historical proof, over three hundred years 
old. 

" The origin of the Congregationalists is 
commonly ascribed to Robert Brown, who 
organized a church in England in 1583, who 
were called Brownists." There may have 
been some Churches formed upon Congrega- 
tional principles a few years earlier, in the 
reign of Edward the VI. and Queen Mary. 
Brown's church, however, seems to have 

* Note D. f Note E. 



48 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



come to nought. About the beginning of 
the 17th century, John Robinson appeared, 
who has been called the father of Modern 
Congregationalism. He gathered a congre- 
gation in England, went to Holland, and 
thence a portion of his people emigrated to 
America in 1620. They rejected the doc- 
trine of an Apostolical succession of the 
ministry. They regarded the congregation 
as having all power, in the matter of confer- 
ring the ministerial commission. Hence, 
the congregation having chosen one of their 
number a minister, had a right to ordain 
him, and having ordained him he was 
thereby made a minister of Christ. The 
Episcopal Church holds to the principle, that 
no man can give to another, a power that he 
does not himself possess ; that a congrega- 
tion of men cannot make ministers of God, 
any more than they can make Sacraments. 
A stream can never run higher than the 
fountain from which it proceeds. Christ 
called and sent His Apostles with power to 
send others. This was before the Church 
had any organic form. He did not organize 
a congregation and give them power to com- 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 49 



mission His ministers. On the other hand 
the ministers, with their commissions from 
Christ, gathered and organized the believers 
into congregations and Churches.* 

The first Baptist Church of which there 
is any record, was organized in March, 1639, 
by Roger Williams, in Rhode Island. Mr. 
Williams was a minister of the Church of 
England. Mr. Ezekiel Holliman, a layman, 
immersed Mr. Williams, and Mr. Williams 
in turn immersed Mr. Holliman. This de- 
nomination hold that by baptism, a person is 
admitted into the Church of Christ, and that 
immersion is, the only mode of baptism. 
Hence, all who have not been immersed are 
unbaptized. Mr. Holliman was not only not 
a minister, but he wa* ^ot a member of the 
Church, and so this layman, himself itnbap- 
tized, administers baptism to Mr. Williams. 
With such a baptism, Mr. Williams proceeds 
to baptize as a minister. And then and 
there commenced the Baptist Church. The 
first association of Baptists was held in Lon- 
don in 1689. f In respect to a body of 
Christians who reject infants from the cov- 



* Note F. 

5 



f Note G. 



50 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



enant, — who restrict the administration of 
baptism to one mode, — whose baptism is to 
be traced to a layman, — whose ministerial 
commission came from the congregation, 
and that only a little more than two hun- 
dred years ago, the Episcopal Church must 
be Protestant. 

To the Unitarians, who are still younger, 

— who have neither the Apostolic Ministry 
nor the Apostolic faith, — the Quakers, who 
have neither the Ministry nor the Sacra- 
ments, — the Shakers, and the multitude of 
sects whose peculiarities I cannot describe, 

— to all these the Episcopal Church is sim- 
ply Pkotestant. By quietly but firmly ad- 
hering to the " faith once delivered to the 
Saints," — by holding to the Ministry as the 
Apostles ordained and transmitted it, she 
bears her faithful testimony against every 
form of error, whether it spring from Rome 
or Geneva, England or America. 

II. I now propose to notice very briefly 
the doctrines of the Church. 

1. The teaching of the Church on the 
subject of human depravity. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



51 



The doctrines of the Church are set forth 
in her Liturgy, Articles, and Homilies. 

In these she teaches that " all men are 
conceived and born in sin," * and " there is 
no health in us." f " Original sin is the 
fault and corruption of the nature of every 
man, that naturally is engendered of the 
offspring of Adam ; whereby man is very far 
gone from original righteousness, and is, of 
his own nature, inclined to evil." J 

Such is the Church's teaching of the nat- 
ural sinfulness of man. 

2. What is her belief in the nature and 
necessity of a change of heart ? In one of 
her Articles, and almost every where in her 
offices, she teaches and inculcates, as a fun- 
damental doctrine of Scripture, man's utter 
inability to do any thing good, without God's 
" special grace, which he must learn at all 
times to call for by diligent prayer." The 
language of Article X. is : " The condition 
of man, after the fall of Adam, is such that 
he cannot turn and prepare himself, by his 
own natural strength and good works, to 
faith and calling upon God ; wherefore we 

* Baptismal Service. f Gen. Con. % Art. IX. 



52 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



have no power to do good works, pleasant 
and acceptable to God without the grace of 
God by Christ preventing us, that we may 
have a good will, and working with us, 
when we have that good will." Morning 
and evening her ministers pray : " God, 
make clean our hearts within us." In the 
collect for Ash Wednesday occurs this pe- 
tition : " Create and make in us new and 
contrite hearts." 

3. The doctrine of the Divinity of Christ is 
interwoven with every part of the Prayer Book. 
The beams of the Sun of Righteousness 
shine forth from every page of the Liturgy. 
The Divinity of the Son of God is, as it were, 
crystallized in the Liturgy. The Church ev- 
ery where holds up Christ, in His divine na- 
ture, as the corner stone of all she has, or 
does, or hopes for, in the work of salvation. 
In the fact of His death she recognizes the 
great atoning sacrifice for the sins of the 
whole world. In the all-sufficiency of that 
atonement, she trusts and thus expresses her 
belief in the language of Article XXXI. : 
" The offering of Christ once made is that 
perfect redemption, propitiation, and satis- 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



53 



faction, for all the sins of the whole world, 
both original and actual ; and there is none 
other satisfaction for sin, but that alone." 

4. The doctrine of the Trinity is held and 
taught as one of the first principles of the 
Gospel, and is fully set forth in the Liturgy 
and Articles. 

5. Touching the doctrine of justification 
by faith, nothing can be more explicit than 
the language of Article XI. : " We are ac- 
counted righteous before God, only for the 
merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ 
by faith, and not for our own works or de- 
servings. Wherefore, that we are justified 
by faith only, is a most wholesome doctrine, 
and very full of comfort." 

It is the less necessary to elaborate a scrip- 
tural argument to prove, that these cardinal 
doctrines are a part of the " faith once de- 
livered to the Saints," inasmuch as we hold 
them in common, with what are termed the 
Orthodox or Evangelical bodies of Protestant 
Christians around us. 

The Church, in Article XXVIL, sets forth 
the duty of bringing children to baptism in 
these words : " The baptism of young chil- 
5* 



54 



WHY I AMT A CHURCHMAN. 



dren is in any wise to be retained in the 
Church, as most agreeable with the institu- 
tion of Christ." 

Infant baptism was practised universally 
throughout Christendom, until the seven- 
teenth century, and is in accordance with 
the practice of nineteen twentieths of all 
Christendom at the present day. 

When God first established His Church on 
earth, He decided, for reasons which it does 
not become us to question, that His Church 
should be composed of adults and infants. 
By His explicit command little children, at 
the age of eight days, were to be made mem- 
bers of the Church, by receiving the seal of 
the Covenant. When Christ was an infant, 
He too was circumcised. When He entered 
upon His ministry, He changed the seal, but 
He did not change the covenant or the sub- 
jects of it. All the time He was on the earth 
infants were circumcised. The rite was held 
most dear by His own people, the Jews, 
and of it they were jealous, as of a privilege 
of inestimable value. They charged Christ 
with many things, and sought by every ex- 
pedient in their power, to bring reproach 



WMY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 55 

upon Him, and dishonor upon His cause. 
They endeavored on every occasion, to stir 
up the people against Him, and yet, strange 
to say, they never charged Him with de- 
priving them of the privilege of placing their 
children within the covenant. Very many 
things in the Mosaic Church were to be ab- 
rogated. Christ did not leave either His 
friends or His enemies in any doubt, as to 
what He taught. If there was to be a change 
so fundamental as this — one which touched 
a tender spot in the heart of every child of 
Abraham — one that was so completely to 
revolutionize the mode of membership — - 
how can we account for the Saviour's silence ? 
We are sometimes tauntingly challenged to 
produce a single instance of infant baptism, 
in the New Testament, as if the want of such 
a record was an unanswerable argument in 
proof, that the practice is unscriptural. That 
very silence is one of the strongest arguments 
in favor of infant baptism. If children had 
been admitted to the Church from the time of 
Abraham, a period of more than eighteen 
hundred years, and they were to continue to 
be members of the covenant, through all 



56 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

time to come, why should any thing be said 
about it, what occasion would there be to 
speak of it ? If, on the other hand, this cus- 
tom of eighteen hundred years was to be ab- 
rogated, and children were no longer to be 
members of the Church, then we should look 
for some explicit mention of such change. 

In the second century we find this custom 
prevailing every where throughout the Chris- 
tian Church ; nobody objecting to it as an 
innovation, or as a new doctrine, which the 
Apostles did not teach. If it had not the 
sanction of Christ and His Apostles, how 
could it have been thus early introduced uni- 
versally, in the Church, with no record of a 
single objection from any quarter, in an 
age, when men were living, who had con- 
versed with those who had seen the Apostles, 
and this, too, in the purest period of the 
Church, when the least indication of error 
in doctrine was promptly met and promptly 
denounced ? While the date of the intro- 
duction of every heresy in the Christian 
Church can be readily pointed out, the most 
learned opponent of infant baptism has never 
yet been able to adduce a particle of credible 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



57 



historical testimony, which tells the time and 
the place where this practice took its rise.* 

To say that an unconscious child is not a fit 
subject for membership in the Church of the 
living God, is to accuse the Almighty of 
folly. Let it be remembered, that the idea 
of infant membership of the Church was not 
a suggestion of Abraham, but a command 
of Jehovah. It is sometimes objected, that 
Christ came to bring the Mosaic dispensation 
to an end, with all that pertained to it. If 
this were so, the chain of the argument is 
not long enough to reach Infant Baptism, for 
the Church membership of infants was not a 
Mosaic, but a Patriarchal institution. 

As to the mode of baptism, the Church 
considers that the application of water to the 
person, by the minister, 64 in the name of 
the Father, and of the Son, and of the 
Holy Ghost," is valid baptism, whether it 
be by aspersion or by immersion. Sacra- 
ments are essentially symbols, and it is plain 
that the significance of a symbol cannot 
depend upon the quantity of the matter 
employed. There must be water in the 
sacrament of baptism, as there must be bread 

* Note H. 



58 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



and wine in the sacrament of the Lord's 
Supper. To the communicant who receives 
the consecrated symbols in faith, a crumb of 
bread and a drop of wine are to him, as es- 
sentially a sacrament, as a loaf of bread and 
cup of wine could possibly be. Moreover, 
the word baptize, whatever it may mean 
when used by heathen classics, does not mean 
cxclu:ively immersion as used in Holy Scrips 
ture. If we would know the definition of 
this term as employed in the Gospel, we are 
not to go to the dictionaries for its significa- 
tion, but to the Bible. 

There is no passage in the Old or Xew 
Testament, where it can be shown that this 
word means immersion. The most that can 
be said is, that in certain texts immersion is 
possible, and perhaps probable. On the other 
hand, there are texts in which the word oc- 
curs, where it not only does not, but cannot 
mean immersion. Thus we are told that the 
Israelites were baptized unto Moses in the 
cloud and in the sea.* And yet the Israel- 
ites were on " dry land," and " under the 
cloud." There is, then, a baptism which a 

* 1 Cor. x. 2 ; Exod. xiv. 16-22. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



59 



person may receive, while standing on dry 
land. Such a baptism cannot, by any possi- 
bility, be immersion. 

Again ; Christ promised that His disciples 
should be baptized with the Holy Ghost.* 
Thus the Saviour explicitly declared, that 
when the Apostles should receive the Holy 
Spirit it would be a baptism. On the day 
of Pentecost, they received the fulfilment 
of this promise. In what way? Let St. 
Peter answer : " This is that which was 
spoken by the Prophet Joel; and it shall 
come to pass, in the last days, (saith God,) 
I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh." f 
We have here the declaration of a prophet, 
that the Holy Spirit would be "poured out." 
We have the declaration of the Saviour, 
that the Holy Spirit would be given to His 
Apostles, and when given, \t would be a bap- 
tism. We have the testimony of St. Peter, 
that the promise of Christ, and the prophecy 
of Joel, were both fulfilled on the day of 
Pentecost ; and so we have here, on an 
authority that cannot be gainsaid, a definition 
of the word baptism, viz. : " pouring-;" and 



* Acts i. 5. 



f Acts ii. 16, 1|. 



60 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



thus baptism and pouring are one and the 
same thing. 

Again, we are told by St. Mark that " the 
Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash 
their hands oft, eat not." " And when they 
come from the market, except they baptize 
(BamtvcoPTat,^^ they eat not." In our Eng- 
lish version it is translated wash. Here the 
application of a small quantity of water to 
a small portion of the body is called a bap- 
tism. No one will pretend, that every time 
a Jew went home from the market, he 
plunged into the water all over. We learn 
the custom from the context : " Except they 
wash (viywvjai) their hands oft, they eat 
not." Says St. Mark : " Many other things 
there be, which they have received to hold, 
as the baptism (Bamiafxovg) of cups, and pots, 
and brazen vessels, and of tables." * In 
our version it is rendered washings. These 
baptisms were purifications from legal or 
ceremonial uncleanness. Does any body 
suppose, that every time a table or a couch 
was defiled by the merest touch of some- 
thing legally unclean, that it was immersed 

* Mark vii. 3, 4. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



61 



in water ? The thing would be utterly im- 
practicable. Besides, there is no evidence 
whatever, that the Jews ever did any such 
thing. If you would know what these bap- 
tisms were, and how they were performed, 
you have only to turn to the Book of Num- 
bers,* where the whole ceremony is described, 
which consists in sprinkling water upon the 
furniture to be cleansed, with a bunch of hys- 
sop. For this purpose families were supplied 
with " water-pots of stone, containing two 
or three firkins apiece." f 

The word baptize has a generic meaning, 
similar to our English word travel. A per- 
son is said to travel when he walks, when he 
rides upon a horse, when he sails in a ship. 
A person is baptized when he is immersed, 
when he is sprinkled, and when water is 
poured upon him. The ministers of the 
Episcopal Church baptize by immersion, 
when that mode is required by those who 
are to receive it. The almost universal 
practice is, however, by aspersion. To hold 
to immersion as the only mode of baptism, 
would involve ministers in a serious di- 



* Num. xix. 18. 

6 



f John ii. 6. 



62 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

lemma. The command of Christ is to " go 
into all the world and preach the Gospel to 
every creature, and baptize them." There 
is no exception made in favor of any class 
whatever. If immersion be the only mode, 
then a person, who is on a dying bed, cannot 
be baptized. If he have an acute disease in 
his body, his soul cannot be admitted into 
covenant with God, and cannot therefore 
have the benefit, that pertains to a covenant 
relation to God. What is disease but a fruit 
of the fall ? In this case the effect of sin in 
a perishing body is made an effectual bar- 
rier against the admission of the soul into 
the kingdom of God ; for Christ has said, 
— "Except a man be born of water, and of 
the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom 
of God." * Can we suppose that the Saviour 
would institute any such mode of admission 
into his spiritual kingdom, as could be en- 
joyed only, by those who were favored with 
good bodily health ? What has the condition 
of a man's mortal body to do with the salva- 
tion of his immortal spirit ? Baptism is the 
seal of the covenant, and may be applied to 

* Join iii. o. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



63 



every creature, whatever the condition of his 
body. Christ's spiritual kingdom is brought 
into no such relationship to the infirmities oil 
human life, and the salvation of the soul is 
put into no such condition of dependence, 
upon the health of the body. 

I have thus far considered those distinc- 
tive principles of the Church, which are 
necessary to its existence: the Word, the 
Sacraments, and the Ministry. I now pro- 
ceed to consider the distinctive features of 
our Church, which, though important, are 
not absolutely essential, and may be mod- 
ified.* 

Leaving the Doctrines of the Church, we 
pass to a brief notice of its Worship. 

III. The public services of the sanctuary 
are conducted according to a prescribed form. 

What, it may be asked, is the authority 
and what is the utility of a Liturgy ? I 
hardly need remark, that forms of prayer 
are no new thing. If you ask me where 
they originated, I answer, in Heaven. The 
very first suggestion of a precomposed form 

* Preface to the Prayer Book. 



6-4 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

of divine service, came from God himself. 
Liturgies, are, therefore, no human invention. 

When the Tabernacle had been erected, 
and the people gathered into it, God gave 
to Moses a form of words, wherewith he 
should bless the people when they departed, 
saying : " The Lord bless thee, and keep 
thee," <fec* When an Israelite brought to 
the priest " the first fruits," he was required 
to repeat a certain form of words. Just be- 
fore the death of Moses, God commanded 
him to write a song commemorative of God's 
mercies, which the Israelites and their de- 
scendants were required to use. In the 
time of Christ, the Jews had a Liturgy, in 
their synagogues. In this service he himself 
joined. He rebuked the Jews for many 
things, but never for using a Liturgy. He 
censured them for formality but never for 
employing forms of prayer. He reproved 
the Pharisees for their pride, and formality, 
and long " prayers, which they made, stand- 
ing at the corners of "the streets, to be seen 
of men." These prayers were made to at- 
tract the public attention, and so to win the 

* Num vi. 22-26. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 65 



praise of passers-by, and, therefore, may 
have been extemporaneous. 

The Jews had never been accustomed to 
any other than a Liturgical form of worship. 
When John the Baptist appeared, who was 
the appointed forerunner of Christ, and 
whose ministry was not, therefore, of the Jew- 
ish economy, while the Christian Church was 
not yet established, he very naturally pre- 
pared a service suited to his peculiar mission. 
He gave to his disciples a form of prayer. 

When Christ entered upon His ministry, 
He continued to attend upon the Temple 
and Synagogue service, and sometimes took 
part in that service.* When His disciples 
came to him, with the request that He would 
furnish them with a form of prayer, as John 
had done for his disciples, He did not reply 
to this request that John did that, which 
was indeed allowed in the Jewish service, 
but was not to be permitted in the more 
spiritual worship of the Christian Church. 
So far from this, He immediately framed a 
form of prayer, gave it to His disciples, and 
told them to use it. It is not a little re- 



* Luke iv. 16, 20. 

e* 



66 



WHY I AM A CHTTRCHMAN. 



markable, that this form is taken mainly 
from the Jewish Liturgy.* It is sometimes 
objected by those who are not accustomed to 
a Liturgical service, that prayers in a par- 
ticular form of words cannot come from the 
heart. When our Saviour was in the gar- 
den, on the night of His betrayal, He prayed 
in the midst of the agonies of that awful 
hour. Think you the prayer He offered to 
His Father, did not come from His heart? 
Yet He used a form ! He prayed three 
times, using a form of words. f Again, when 
hanging on the cross He prayed. Did ever 
mortal man doubt, that the prayer upon the 
cross came from the heart of that crucified 
Saviour ? And yet that prayer was a form, 
in these words : " My God, my God, why hast 
thou forsaken me ; " a quotation from the 
twenty-second Psalm. The last sentence 
that fell from His lips, ere He gave up the 
ghost, was taken from the thirty-first Psalm : 
" Father, into Thy hands I commend my 
spirit." Thus the Saviour of the world died 
with a form of prayer upon His lips. 
.The Apostles, like their divine Master, 

* Note I. t Matt. xxvi. 36, 44. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



67 



were accustomed to the Liturgical worship 
of the Jews ; — they, with Him, attended the 
Temple and the Synagogue service. Such 
was the strength of their attachment to a 
Liturgy, and so firm the habit of using a 
form, that on the occasion of the liberation 
of St. Peter from prison, when their hearts 
were overflowing with joy, and when, if ever, 
they would spontaneously express their grat- 
itude in an extemporaneous thanksgiving, 
they employed a form, " they lifted up their 
voice to God with one accord, and said," 
&c. This form has been recorded by St. 
Luke. It is chiefly from a Psalm of David.* 
We are not then surprised to find the 
Churches which they planted, employing 
forms of prayer in their worship. 

For fifteen hundred years, Liturgies were 
very where used in the Church of Christ. 
The Christian world was pleasantly surprised 
some years ago, by the announcement that- 
the celebrated traveller, Dr. Buchanan, had 
discovered a church of Syrian Christians who 
'ad, for hundreds of years, remained in con- 
cealment from the Christian world, in the 

* Acts iv. 23, 30. 



68 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN, 



mountain fastnesses on the coast of Malabar, 
They had the three orders of Bishops, 
Priests, and Deacons, and they had also a 
Liturgical form of worship. Their tradition 
is, that St. Thomas visited their country and 
founded their church. They have thus been 
preserved by the great Head of the Church, 
and after the lapse of so many ages, come 
forward in this nineteenth century, to bear 
their testimony to Apostolic doctrines and 
usages. 

At the Reformation, the English Church 
retained a prescribed form of worship. 
From that Church we received the Book of 
Common Prayer, which, with a few unim- 
portant alterations, is now used in the Prot- 
estant Episcopal Church.* The spiritual 
excellency of the service, and the divine 
authority for forms of prayer, have taught 
us to heed the injunction of the Apostle , to 
" hold fast the form of sound words." 

Many of the Protestant Communions, who 
have not the Apostolic Ministry, yet retain 
forms of prayer. It may be -safely said, that 
about nineteen-twentienths of all Christen' 
dom have some kind of a Liturgy. 

* Note K. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



69 



We see then, that extemporaneous modes 
of worship are, comparatively, a novelty, and 
are practised by only a very small fraction of 
hristendom. 

The difference between our mode of wor- 
ship and that of those denominations of 
Christians around us, who repudiate a Lit- 
urgy, is not, as it is sometimes stated, a 
question whether divine service should be 
conducted with a form of prayer, or without 
a form of prayer. All use a form. There 
is no such thing as a formless mode of wor- 
ship. They who pretend to discard every 
appearance of form, are sometimes the most 
formal. Thus the Quakers are rigidly for- 
mal in their worship. 

When a minister rises in the pulpit, to 
conduct the services of public worship, he 
says, and that very properly: "Let us 
pray" What does he mean ? Simply 
this : he asks the congregation to unite with 
him in prayer to Almighty God. He does 
not say, let me pray ; but let us pray, — you 
and me. Yet, he is the only person who 
prays aloud. How then are the people to do 
as he has asked them to do ? They are to 



70 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

pray by uniting with him ; i. e., he frames a 
petition, speaks it aloud, and so hands it 
over to them, and they take it, and unite 
with him in offering it to God, as their pe- 
tition. He makes the form, and they use it. 
The difference then between such and our- 
selves is this : that inasmuch as we must 
have a form of prayer, they prefer to trust to 
their minister to make it for them on the 
occasion, without knowing what it is to be ; 
and we prefer to have one already made, 
which we know all about ; so that we may 
pray " with the spirit, and with the under- 
standing also." The Church proceeds, in 
matters of public worship, on the principle, 
that the house of God is the "house of 
prayer : " that the great business of the 
Lord's people on the Lord's day, is to " wor- 
ship Him in the beauty of holiness." The 
people cannot commission any one else to 
do this for them. There are no proxies in 
the duties of religion. We cannot delegate 
to another a duty which God requires of us. 
Our form of worship is framed upon the 
principle, that there are to be no spectators 
in the congregation of God's people. All 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 71 



sorts and conditions of men are there for a 
purpose, and that purpose is the worship of 
God. One, as much as another, is required 
to acknowledge his sinfulness, — invoke the 
divine forgiveness, — praise God for His 
blessings, and ask for His future grace and 
guidance. All then, young and old, should 
join in the services of the Sanctuary. Some 
good people seem to entertain the idea, that 
prayer, in order to be prayer, must be ex- 
temporaneous ; that only such prayers come 
from the heart. They forget, that while all 
true prayer does come and must come from 
the heart, i. e., it is and must be the sincere 
language of the soul, yet words, whether ex- 
temporaneous or written, do not come from 
the heart but from the head. What God 
requires, and what the necessities of our be- 
ing demand is, that the words we use, (and 
which serve only as the vehicle of our peti- 
tions,) should be such as properly and rev- 
erently express our sincere desires to God. 
Prayers are not orations. They are not ad- 
dressed to men, but to God. They are not 
designed to produce an effect on earth, but 
in heaven. God is not particularly pleased 



72 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



with a variety. " He is the same yesterday, 
to-day, and forever." 

Some persons fancy that they should tire 
of the rise of the same modes of expression, 
Sunday after Sunday. The proper answer 
to such is : you, yourselves, do not tire of the 
use of the same modes of expression, Sunday 
after Sunday, where you now are. If the 
extemporaneous prayers of the most gifted 
minister, were to be written down, as he of- 
fers them, on every occasion of public wor- 
ship, for the space of a year, it would be 
found that there is but a very little variety 
in the devotional exercises of his pulpit. 
Again, if some of our beloved brethren in 
other societies, were as familiar with the 
Prayer Book, as they might be, they would 
know to what source they are sometimes 
indebted, for some of the choicest passages 
in the extemporaneous prayers of their 
Pastors. 

Man is so constituted that he cannot serve 
two masters at the same time, either in his 
inner or in his outer life. A deep exercise 
of devotion and an active exercise of the 
inind cannot well be carried on 3 in the same 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 73 

soul at one and the same time. If the mind 
of a minister is in a deep study as to what 
he shall say and how he shall say it, there 
cannot be a very lively exercise of the spirit 
of pure devotion in his heart, while he is 
thus engaged in searching after thoughts 
and suitable language, in which to clothe 
them. But what is the condition of the 
hearers in the mean time ? Their minds 
are also exercised, because they must be on 
the alert, since they know not what is com- 
ing. And when the words come, it may be 
that they are not all of them suitable, or are 
not grammatically expressed, or come after 
much stammering and hesitation, or they are 
in the form of petitions for things, which the 
worshipper does not want. The involun- 
tary response of his mind, is: "I do not 
agree to that." Now amid this various 
mental activity what has become of the 
spirit of devotion, the earnest feeling of sup- 
plication, — the real soul of all prayer ? It 
is well nigh strangled in this unhappy con- 
flict of thought. Let us for a moment see 
how these objections, to an extemporaneous 
mode of worship are obviated, in the use of 
7 



74 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

the Liturgy of the Protestant Episcopal 
Church. When the worshipper enters the 
Church, he feels that he is entering the 
House of God. There is to him a sanctity 
pertaining to it, which does not attach to 
any other place, since, when once consecrated 
to the worship of God, it is " separated from 
all unhallowed, worldly, and common uses." * 
He takes off his hat when he enters the 
door, and he does not put it on until he 
passes out of the door. He does not do in 
the house of God, what would be deemed 
disrespectful in the house of his neighbor. 
On taking his seat, he bows his head and 
silently invokes God's blessing. Very soon 
the Minister appears, clad in his clerical 
robes. But some of my hearers may say, 
pray tell us, what is the authority and utility 
of clerical vestments ? I am happy to an- 
swer, for I am here for the purpose of ex- 
planation. As to the authority, I have only 
to say, that God has once, in the Mosaic 
dispensation, expressed His pleasure in this 
regard, and He has never annulled that ex- 
pression of His will. It was in His view 

* Office of Consecration. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



75 



fitting, that His ministers should wear a vest- 
ment, when officiating at His altar, which 
they did not wear on any other occasion. 
The long custom of the Christian Church 
has sanctioned the use of clerical robes. 
Although we have no positive law on the 
subject, yet it is proper that a minister in 
the House of God, should appear in a habit, 
which is peculiar to the services of the Sanc- 
tuary, and being worn on no other occasions, 
is identified with the ministerial office. 
Again : it serves to remove from the minds 
of the congregation, all occasion for the in- 
dulgence of idle and wandering thoughts. 
It matters, not who is to officiate, whether 
their own Rector or a stranger ; there is no 
temptation to curious speculation as to his 
appearance, whether well or ill clad, in fash- 
ion or out of fashion. All frivolous distinc- 
tions of this sort, which serve to distract the 
attention of the congregation are effectually 
and happily concealed. In this respect all 
ministers are placed on an equality.* The 

* A person once asked the late venerable and beloved 
Bishop Griswold, why our ministers wore the surplice ? The 
wise old Bishop answered, " To conceal the ever-changing 
fashions of man.'\ 



76 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

mind of the worshipper is at once put to rest, 
as to the mode of the service, whoever may 
be the officiating clergyman. His spirit of 
dfevotion is exposed to no serious disturbance, 
as to the matter of the prayers or the manner 
of conducting the services. The worshipper 
has nothing to do, but to pour out his heart 
as best he can in prayer and praise, and de- 
voutly listen to the teachings of the Word 
of God. 

It is sometimes objected that there are 
many and unmeaning changes of position in 
our service. It is very true, there are in our 
mode of worship frequent changes of position. 
When we pray we kneel; when we praise 
we stand; when we listen to the Word we 
sit. Our position is made to conform to the 
nature of the particular service in which we 
are engaged. These frequent changes, so 
far from being objectionable, are, physically 
considered, a relief, since they serve to pre- 
vent the fatigue which necessarily attends a 
long continuance in one position. 

As all persons have not a voice to sing, 
and yet all persons ought to join audibly in 
some form of praise, the Church provides 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 77 

that a portion of the Psalms of David shall 
be read responsively, by minister and people, 
morning and evening. A lesson from the 
Old Testament and one from the New are 
also read both morning and evening. In 
addition to these some part of one of the 
Epistles and a portion of one of the Gos- 
pels, together with the Ten Commandments, 
are read in the morning. There is no ser- 
vice in any part of Christendom, where pro- 
vision is made for the daily reading of so 
much Holy Scripture as in the Church of 
England and the Protestant Episcopal Church 
in the United States. At every service we 
are required to repeat the articles of our 
belief, in the form of a creed. The Church 
has a Creed, because she is the Church. 
There can be no such thing as a Christian 
Church without a Christian Creed. There- 
are some persons, I am aware, who affect to 
have no creed. But Christ has effectually 
settled the practicability of such a theological 
anomaly. Nobody can go to heaven without 
a creed. Creed is belief. Christ has said, 
" He that believeth not shall be damned" 
The services of the Church are so arranged 
•7* 



78 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



that every prominent event in the Saviour's 
life, every cardinal doctrine of the Gospel, 
are regularly brought to the attention of the 
congregation throughout the year, so that, if 
the people are not thoroughly instructed in 
every part of the Gospel system of salvation, 
it is their own fault. The Church is too 
good a mother to her children, to intrust 
so vital a matter to the faithfulness of her 
individual ministers. A minister may be 
false to his charge — he may swerve from 
the faith ; but however unsound he may be 
in the pulpit, he is compelled to be Orthodox 
in the reading desk ; and when the Desk and 
the Pulpit begin to contradict each other, 
the people will soon discover that something 
is out of joint, and will take measures to 
have the unsound member reduced or cut 
off. 

" The Church of Christ is the ground and 
pillar of the truth ; " as such, it is, and ever 
is to be, the great Conservator of the Truth. 

It is the divinely ordained Guardian of 
the " Faith once delivered to the Saints." 
The most effectual instrumentality of doing 
this office is by means- of a Liturgy. It is. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 79 

under God, the great safeguard of the peo- 
ple. The devil never shows his marvellous 
skill more effectually, than when he seeks to 
undermine the faith of Christians. He rare- 
ly, if ever, begins with the laity. He would 
make but slow headway if he did ; for if he 
succeeded in making an apostate, he would 
only count one. But if he can poison the 
mind of a minister, and make a heretic of 
him, he has seized hold of the long end of a 
lever, with which he may tip a whole congre- 
gation out of the Ark of Salvation. A min- 
ister who is not tied to a Liturgy will do as 
much mischief in praying heresy, as he will 
in preaching it. By skilfully conforming his 
prayers to his preaching, he conceals the 
change until it has become so great, that it 
can no longer be disguised, and then it is 
too late to avert the consequences * 
. The propriety and necessity of a Liturgy 
have been acknowledged by distinguished 
non-Episcopal divines. The Presbyterians, 
in the time of Cromwell, undertook to con- 
duct public worship after an extemporaneous 
manner ; they soon changed their mind, and 

* Note L. 



80 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



adopted a form of prayer. The Presbyteri- 
ans of Scotland at the Reformation used 
a liturgy. Richard Baxter prepared a litur- 
gy, and sought to have it introduced into 
public use. John Wesley set forth a liturgy 
for the use of the Methodists in this country. 
John Calvin, at Geneva, composed a liturgy 

for the Sunday service. 

Of the excellence of the English Prayer 
Book, of which our own is almost an exact 
copy, Dr. Adam Clarke, the distinguished 
Methodist, thus speaks : " It is the greatest 
effort of the Reformation, next to the trans- 
lation of the Scriptures into the English lan- 
guage As a form of devotion it has 

no equal in any part of the Universal Church 
of God. .... Next to the Bible, it is the 
Book of my understanding, and of my heart." 
Robert Hall, the eloquent English Baptist, 
thus speaks of it : "I believe that the evan- 
gelical purity of its sentiments, the chastened 
fervor of its devotions, and the majestic sim- 
plicity of its language, have combined to 
place it in the very first rank of uninspired 
compositions." Dr. Doddridge, the eminent 
commentator, who was a Congregationalist, 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN, 



81 



thus speaks of it : " The language is so plain 
as to be level to the capacity of the meanest, 
and yet the sense is so noble as to raise the 
capacities of the greatest." These are the 
voluntary testimonies of a Methodist, Bap- 
tist, and Congregationalist, of whom the least 
that can be said is, that they were the ' first 
among their equals.' 

We come now to the consideration of the 
last of the distinctive principles of the Epis- 
copal Church, which is its Polity. 

IV. The government of the Church is 
Episcopal because its chief ministers are 
Bishops, an<J not because it is chiefly gov- 
erned by Bishops. The Bishops in our 
Church have but little ecclesiastical power. 
Their duty is to ordain Deacons, and in con- 
junction with the Presbytery, to admit Dea- 
cons to the Priesthood — ordain Bishops, — 
to consecrate Churches, — preside at conven- 
tions, and to perform the Apostolic rite of 
Confirmation, or the laying of hands on bap- 
tized persons, who desire to take upon them- 
selves their baptismal vows, and thereby make 
a profession of their faith before the world. 



82 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



This custom, commenced by the Apostles, 
has been continued in the Church from that 
day to this.* 

The government of the Church is purely 
republican. It is strikingly analogous to 
that of the Municipal, State, and General 
Government, in this country. I cannot bet- 
ter describe it, than by giving a brief outline 
of its practical operation. A number of lay- 
men meet together and organize a parish, 
by the choice of two Wardens and a Board 
of Vestrymen. To them is committed the 
management of all the temporal affairs of 
the parish. The members of the parish 
choose their own minister. Once a year, on 
Easter Monday, parish meetings are held for 
the choice of Wardens and Vestrymen, who 
answer to the Board of Selectmen or Town 
Council, and for the election of delegates to 
the Diocesan Conventions. These lay dele- 
gates, with the ministers of the several par- 
ishes, meet annually in Convention. The 
Bishop presides, but has no other voice than 
that of a presiding officer. The clergy and 
laity assemble together, but form, in fact. 



* Note M. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



83 



two distinct houses ; and when it is so re- 
quired by any delegation, they must vote 
separately. In such a case there must be a 
concurrence of both Orders, the clerical and 
the lay. Thus the laity represent the House 
of Representatives in our State Legislature, 
— the clergy, the Senate, and the Bishop, 
the Governor. This Diocesan Convention 
appoint a Standing Committee, consisting of 
three laymen and three clergymen, who are 
a Council of Advice to the Bishop. The 
Bishop has no right to ordain a Deacon or a 
Priest until the consent and recommendation 
of this Committee is first obtained. This 
Committee answers to the Governor } s Court- 
cil. The State, or Diocesan Convention, 
choose four clergymen and four laymen to 
represent the Diocese, or State, in the Gen- 
eral Convention. This General Convention 
meets once in three years, and consists of 
like delegations, from every diocese in the 
Union, where the Church has an organiza- 
tion. The Bishops of the Church meet by 
themselves, and answer to the Senate of the 
United States. The clerical and lay depu- 
ties meet together and organize, by choosing 



84 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



one of their number as President. Both 
laity and clergy commonly vote together; 
but if the delegation of any diocese require 
it, the vote must be taken by orders, i. e., the 
clergy and laity voting separately, there 
must be a concurrence of both orders, or the 
vote is not carried. A measure must have 
the concurrence of the House of Bishops, 
before it can become a law. The influence 
of the laity in the legislation of the Church 
may be seen by this illustration. If a meas-- 
ure should pass the House of Bishops by a 
unanimous vote, and coming to the lower 
house, should receive the vote of every cler- 
gyman, and then should be lost by one ma- 
jority on the part of the laity, it could not 
become a law. Such is the organization of 
our National Ecclesiastical Congress, which 
commonly embraces many of the ablest men 
in the Church. 

Our polity secures healthful discipline. 
Every clergyman must belong to some Epis- 
copal jurisdiction. There can be no such 
thing as an Episcopal clergyman at large. 
If a stranger present himself to me as a 
clergyman of the Church, the first question 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



85 



is : Where do you belong ? He cannot call 
himself a cosmopolite, — as belonging every 
where, and having a home nowhere. He 
must have a canonical, if not a " local hab- 
itation." If he answer : Kansas, Texas, Or- 
egon, or California, I have only to turn to 
the list of the clergy in that diocese and as- 
certain the fact. 

Our parishes choose their own ministers ; 
but they do not make them, and they cannot 
unmake them ; nor can they retain them 
after the Church has suspended or degraded 
them. If a clergyman commits a crime, for 
which he should be displaced from the Min- 
istry, he is tried by an Ecclesiastical Court, 
and if found guilty and sentenced to be de- 
graded, that sentence is passed upon him, 
and he is at once put out of the Ministry ; 
and this fact is forthwith communicated to 
every diocese in the United States. He can- 
not henceforth officiate any where as an Epis- 
copal clergyman, nor is there any canonical 
provision for his future restoration to the 
Ministry. It matters not how influential 
his parish. They may love him so well as 
to wink at his crime ; they may be more 
8 



86 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 

than willing to forgive ; they may seek to 
cover up his iniquity, and strive to white- 
wash the stain of his criminality, but the 
Church stretches out the hand of her dis- 
cipline, and takes him from these fond ad- 
mirers, and puts him upon his trial by a 
court composed of his peers. He has com- 
mitted an offence against the Church, against 
the cause of Christ, to the scandal of true 
religion ; and the Church is bound to protect 
that religion, by purging herself of a cor- 
rupt member.* His parish is as impotent 
as is the family of a man, who has committed 
a high crime and has been arrested by the 
civil authority. What a contrast between 
such a discipline and that which obtains in 
other systems, where a congregation have 
only to throw their arms around their min- 
ister, however corrupt, and he maintains 
his position as their preacher, to the great 
reproach of religion. Or should he be tried 
and found guilty, and sentenced to degrada- 
tion from the ministry, there is no power to 
execute it ; and he may, if he please, go 
back to his former congregation, if they will 

Note N. 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 87 



have him, or gather a new one, perhaps in 
the midst of the scene of his iniquity. 

Such are some of the distinctive principles 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church, as seen 
in its Ministry, Doctrines, Worship, and 
Polity. I am glad to say, that some of the 
distinctive features of the Episcopal Church 
are becoming less distinctive. The features 
themselves remain in all their fulness, but 
they are becoming less and less distinctive^ 
in consequence of the happy and very prom- 
ising changes, which are going on in other 
religious bodies around us. The time was, 
when an educated Ministry, Gothic church 
edifices, the' use of organs, chanting in pub- 
lic service, the word Church as signifying 
a place of worship, the term " going to 
church," observing the festival of Christ- 
mas, the decoration of churches with ever- 
greens at that festive season, using a Lit- 
urgy, wearing clerical vestments, were 
distinctive features of the Episcopal Church, 
but they are so no longer. Once, special 
pains were taken, in the erection of a place 
of worship to have square windows, in two 
rows like a dwelling house, — to secure the 



88 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



severest simplicity in the architecture. 
These places of worship were called " meet- 
ing-houses," and attendance at divine wor- 
ship was termed "going to meeting?'' It 
would be regarded as an insult, hardly par- 
donable, to apply these terms at the present 
day. Once, it was considered a sin to have 
instrumental music in the Sanctuary, while 
there is now scarcely a place of worship, in 
city or town, that has not an organ. And 
it is by no means uncommon to hear the 
Church chants beautifully sung, in the con- 
gregations of the various religious bodies. 

If a stranger were to conclude that every 
fine Gothic edifice he saw nowadays, was an 
Episcopal Church, he would make a great 
mistake. 

The denominations, who in former days 
inveighed most strongly against an educated 
Ministry, have now more colleges than the 
Episcopal Church. The gown is becoming 
a very common clerical vestment. As to 
crosses, if we were to place gilt crosses upon 
our Churches, as some of our Congregational 
brethren are doing, in- this good old Puritan 
State of Massachusetts, we should no doubt 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



89 



be called Puseyites. But crosses will not 
harm them ; they never harmed us, though 
their appearance has caused much alarm in 
times past. 

The recent introduction of Liturgies into 
public worship, among several denomina- 
tions, is one of the most significant signs of 
an inclination to return to primitive usage. 

There is one other pleasing and promising 
evidence of progress in the right direction. 
It is the fact, that so large a proportion of 
our clergy are from the various denomina- 
tions. The late Bishop Griswold stated in 
1841, that of two hundred and eighty-five 
clergymen, ordained by him, two hundred 
and seven of them, came into the ministry 
of the Episcopal Church, from other denom- 
inations. There are at the present time up- 
wards of eighteen hundred clergymen in the 
Episcopal Church, about twelve hundred of 
whom, it is estimated, came into the Church 
from other folds. May the change continue 
to go on, until not only the features but the 
principles of the Church shall be less and 
less distinctive ; — until there " shall be but 
one fold and one Shepherd." 
8* 



90 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



With a ministry so Apostolic, with a Lit- 
urgy so evangelical, with a Polity so purely 
republican, do you wonder, that I am a 
Churchman, and never can be any thing 
else ? Do you not wonder that you your* 
selves are not ? 

But let us never lose sight of the im* 
portant fact, that the Church, and Ministry < 
and Worship, are not an end, but a means. 
The end is the salvation of the soul, and 
the glory of God. The conditions of thai 
salvation are, repentance of sin and faith in 
our Lord Jesus Christ. May God graciously 
grant us His Holy Spirit, that we may all so 
comply with these conditions, that through 
the merits of Christ's righteousness, we may 
find a place at His right hand, in His King> 
dom above, to go no more out forever. 
Amen. 



NOTES. 



A. (Page 18.) 

" Timothy was ordained an Apostle by the laying on of 
the hands of St. Paul." — 2 Tim. i. 6. 

Some allege that the passage in 1 Tim. iv, 14, refers to 
Timothy's ordination. " Eminent authority has declared 
the word « Presbytery ' to mean the office to which Timothy 
was ordained, not the persons who ordained him ; so that 
the passage would read, * with the laying on of hands to 
confer the presbyterate,' or presbytership, or clerical of- 
fice, in which view the ordainer of Timothy was St. Paul 
himself, as mentioned in 2 Tim. i. 6. 

" Jerome, Ambrose, and other ancients, and Calvin, 
interpret 4 presbyterium? in that place, not an assembly, 
but the office to which Timothy was promoted. 
Should it be said, however, that the word * presbyter- 
ate,' or < presbytership,' proves Timothy to have been then 
ordained a presbyter merely, we would neutralize that 
argument by appealing to 1 Thess. ii. 6, (comp. with i. 1,) 
where he is called an Apostle." — Episcopacy Tested by 
Scripture, pp. 19, 20. 

B. (Page 29.) 

The Puritans of New England held that religious toler- 
ation was wrong. When they left England for America, 
it was not for the purpose of maintaining and enjoying 
the principle of toleration. This point is susceptible of 
abundant proof; hence their perfect consistency, though 
great wickedness, in hanging the Quaker, banishing the 
Baptist, and imprisoning the Churchman. Hutchinson 
says, < 4 that toleration was preached against as a sin in 
rulers, which would bring down the judgments of Heaven 
upon the land." — Hist. I. 75. 

Says Judge Story: "When Sir Richard SaltonstaU 

(91) 



92 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



wrote to them his admirable letter, which pleads with 
such Catholic enthusiasm for toleration, the harsh and 
brief reply was : ' God forbid our love for truth should 
be grown so cold that we should tolerate errors.' 
Yes, the very men who asked from Charles the Second, 
after his restoration, liberty of conscience and worship for 
themselves, were deaf, and dumb, and blind, when it was 
demanded by his commissioners for Episcopalians and 
others." — Story's Misc., p. 65. 

The Puritans felt much aggrieved by the burdens laid 
upon them in England, for the support of the Established 
Church. But as soon as they have a State of their own, 
they not only join the Church to it, but compel Churchmen 
- to pay for the support of their Congregational worship. 
The manner of enforcing ;the collection of this tax is 
illustrated by a case which occurred in the town of Strat- 
ford, Conn. " The Episcopal parish objected to paying 
taxes to the Congregationaiists, on the ground that they 
were legally exempt by the law of England ; and upon 
their refusal, Timothy Titherton, one of the church war- 
dens, and John Marcy, one of the vestrymen, were ar- 
rested about midnight, Dec. 12, 1680, and compelled to 
walk eight miles to jail, where they were confined with- 
out fire or light until they paid the sums demanded." — ■ 
Chapin's Puritanism, p. 121. 



C. (Page 34.) 

It has been a law of the Church, from the Apostolic 
Age, that the ministerial commission can only come from 
Christ, through the Apostles, in an unbroken succession. 
So important did the Church consider this to be, that she 
made a rule, that at every consecration of a Bishop, there 
should be, at least, three Bishops present and joining in 
the laying on of hands, so that if, in the course of time, 
a break should occur in any single line, (which has never 
yet been shown,) there are others which still hold good. 
The burden of proof lies upon those who, denying this 
Apostolic succession, assert that there has been a break, 
to show where and when this break took place. 

It is sometimes said, that in maintaining our theory of 



NOTES. 



93 



the ministry, we violate the Divine Law of Charity. This 
is not so. Christian Charity has nothing to do with his- 
torical facts. The Apostolic Commission is purely a mat- 
ter of fact. We say, that a man must receive the minis- 
terial commission from the Great Head of the Church, 
through the hands of a successor of the Apostles, whose 
authority to ordain ministers has come down, in unbroken 
succession, from the Apostles, and that this being the di- 
vine mode of constituting and perpetuating the Christian 
Ministry, he who has such a commission, is a lawfully 
ordained minister in the Church of Christ. If we believe 
this and consistently carry it out, without impugning the 
motives of those who differ from us, we surely cannot be 
rightfully charged with violating the Christian Law of 
Love. 

Many persons seem to have very indistinct, if not very 
confused notions, as to what constitutes a Minister. 
They speak of certain evangelical preachers as Ministers 
of the Church of Christ ; while there are certain other 
preachers, by whom they would not be baptized, and 
from whom they would not presume to receive the 
Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and whom they would 
not, therefore, recognize as Ministers of Christ. 

Now we beg to ask such persons, how much truth it 
takes to make a Minister and how much error it takes to 
unmake him ? At what point of the upward scale of 
orthodoxy does his Ministerial commission come into be- 
ing, and what degree of the downward scale of hetero- 
doxy, does it go out of being ? And, moreover, who is 
to be the judge of this ? Where is the standard ? "Who 
is to graduate that standard ? If every Christian man is 
to do this, for himself, then it is every Christian man's 
prerogative, to make and unmake Ministers, at his own 
will and pleasure. Who is competent to go through 
this city, and say, according to this rule, this man is a 
Minister of the Lord Jesus Christ, and has the authority 
of the living God, to preach the Gospel of His Son, — 
and that preacher is not a Christian Minister, and has no 
authority to preach and to baptize ? 

There must be a definite mode of determining this 
question. That mode we believe to be . the rule of the 



94 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



Apostolic succession, which obtained every where for fif- 
teen hundred years, — and which obtains very generally 
now. 

D. (Page 47.) 

The Methodists have a Liturgy, in the form of certain 
offices, which they rarely use. Their Bishops have a de- 
gree of ecclesiastical power, which more nearly approaches 
the power of the Bishops of the Church of Rome than 
that which is exercised by any Protestant body of Chris- 
tians in the world. The people have no vote in the choice 
of their preachers. The preachers have no voice as to 
their locality. At the annual conferences, the Bishops 
assign to each minister his place for the year; and no 
preacher can remain in one parish more than two years 
consecutively. The laity have no representation in their 
conferences, and, therefore, no vote in ecclesiastical legis- 
lation. In no Protestant communion are the laity so 
completely excluded from the management of the gen- 
eral affairs of their church, as among the Methodists. 

The evils of this feature of their polity are beginning to 
be felt. This feeling of dissatisfaction led to a division in 
1830. The seceders organized their sect, on the princi- 
ples of Congregationalism. They have thirteen hundred 
preachers and sixty thousand members, and are called 
Protestant Methodists, Another division took place in 
1847. This division call themselves the True Wesleyan 
Methodist Church. They have about six hundred preach- 
ers and twenty thousand members. 



NOTES. 



95 



E. (Page 47.) 

John Calvin, who was the father of Presbyterianism, 
was not a Presbyterian from choice, but from what he re- 
garded as a necessity. Here are his views of Episco- 
pacy : " The Episcopate itself had its appointments from 
God. The office of a Bishop was instituted by the 
authority and denned by the ordinance of God." 

" Let them give us such an hierarchy, in which the 
Bishops may so bear rule that they refuse not to submit 
to Christ, and to depend upon Him as their only Head : 
let them be so united together in a brotherly concord, as 
that His truth shall be their only bond of union ; then, 
indeed, if there shall be any who will not reverence them, 
and pay them the most exact obedience, there is no anath- 
ema, but I confess them worthy of it." — See " Reasons** 
&c, by Richardson, 

John Calvin not only thus sanctioned Episcopacy, but 
desired to be consecrated a Bishop. 

Says Archbishop Abbott : " Perusing some papers of 
our predecessor, Matthew Parker, (Archbishop,) we find 
that John Calvin and others, of the Protestant churches 
of Germany, and elsewhere, would have had Episco- 
pacy, if permitted, but could not upon several accounts." 

It appears that Calvin sent letters, in King Edward VI. 's 
reign, inviting a conference with the clergy on this sub- 
ject, which letters were intercepted by Gardiner and Bon- 
ner, two Romish Bishops, and they never reached their 
destination. Calvin received an answer purporting to be 
from the reformed divines, declining his overtures. In 
the sixth year of Queen Elizabeth's reign these^ letters 
were discovered, but Calvin was then dead. 

Philip Melancthon, a Presbyterian, one of the most 
distinguished of the Continental Reformers, thus speaks 
of Episcopacy : " I would to God it lay in me to restore 
the government of Bishops. Eor I see what manner of 
Church we shall have, the Ecclesiastical polity being dis- 
solved. I do see that, hereafter, there will grow up a 
greater tyranny in the Church than there ever was 
before." 



96 



WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



F. (Page 49.) 

Congregational Ordination, That laymen can make a 
Minister of God, by putting their hands on his head, is a 
doctrine which may startle Congregationalists, who never 
were told that this is a principle of Congregationalism. 
So much of a principle did the Puritans of New England 
make lay ordination, that they even required laymen to 
lay their hands in ordination upon the head of a reg- 
ularly ordained Minister of the Church of England, when 
he desired to enter their ministry — as in the case of Mr. 
Francis Higginson, Avho was ordained at Salem, July 20, 
1629. Mr. H., who was a Minister in the Church of 
England, acting in the capacity of a layman, " with three 
or four more of the gravest members of the Church, laid 
their hands on Mr. Skelton, using prayers therewith." 
Then Mr. Skelton, with the same "present and assist- 
ing" peers, performed the same kind office for Mr. Hig- 
ginson. And thus, says a witness of the scene : "I hope 
you, and the rest of God's people with you, will say that 
here was a right foundation laid, and that these two 
blessed servants of the Lord, came in at the door, and 
not at the window." — Felfs Annals of Salem, p. 28. 
For other instances of Lay Ordination, see Xote 83, p. 
490, Coifs Puritanism, 

Thomas Carter was ordained in ^Worcester in 1642. 
After the candidate ' ' had exercised in preaching and 
praying the greater part of the day, two persons, in the 
name of the Church, laid their hands upon his head, and 
said, < We ordain thee, Thomas Carter, to be pastor unto 
this Church of Christ.' Then one of the neighboring 
ministers, many of whom were present, prayed." 

It is true that ministers among the Congregationalists, 
are now ordained by councils of ministers. This inno- 
vation on the practice of pure Congregationalism, arose 
from the adoption of the " Cambridge Platform " of Church 
polity, 1648, on the part of the General Court in 1651, 
(fourteen dissenting,) by which that platform became an 
organic part of state affairs. 

" This Platform makes a Council necessary for ordina- 
tion, installation, and for the communion of the Churches." 

"All Congregational ordinations are virtually laieal j 
for, as the first were so, all the rest must be." 



NOTES. 



97 



G. (Page 49.) 

Some affirm, that while the Baptists had no organized 
church until the seventeenth century, yet individuals who 
held Baptist sentiments were scattered throughout Chris- 
tendom in early ages, and were known as the Albigenses 
and ^Yaldenses. The Waldenses were a sect, which ap- 
peared in the twelfth century, and had a ministry of Bish- 
ops, Priests, and Deacons. 



H. (Page 57.) 

Tertullian, a Presbyter of Carthage, in the second cen- 
tury, is sometimes quoted as authority against infant bap- 
tism. It is true he did oppose infant baptism. But why ? 
Because it was a novelty — because it was not Apostolic ? 
O, no ; but because he was a follower of a man by the name 
of Montanus, who called himself " the Comforter prom- 
ised by Christ to His disciples," and pretending to be in- 
spired, had the wicked presumption to say that Christ had 
conceded too much to the weakness of the people, and so 
had given an imperfect rule of life. Hence Montanus laid 
down very severe rules of religion, and Tertullian, being 
naturally an austere man, embraced ■ his sentiments, and 
became his ablest defender. Among other strange notions 
indulged by Tertullian, was this : ' < That sin after baptism 
could hardly be pardoned.'* Hence it was that he argued 
for the delay of the baptism of infants. Por the same 
reason he would have adults of certain dispositions put 
off the reception of this Sacrament. The very fact of such 
an objection from such a man, in such an age, is a strong 
argument in favor of infant baptism, inasmuch as it shows 
that, in the second century, infant baptism was practised, 
and was not objected to because it was an innovation, 
but because of an heretical notion about sin after bap- 
tism. 

" About a hundred and fifty years after the times of 
the Apostles, Fidus, an African Bishop, had some doubts 
whether children ought to be baptized before the eighth 
day, in order that the Christian ordinance might more 
correctly correspond with that of Abraham about cireum- 
9 



98 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



cision. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, therefore held a 
convocation of Bishops, for the purpose of settling this 
question. At this Synod, sixty-six Bishops assembled, 
and they came to an unanimous conclusion, that children 
were eligible to baptism from their birth." It will be 
observed, that the question was only as to the time of 
baptism, not as to the fact whether children were to be 
baptized or not. If infant baptism were a heresy, intro- 
duced at some period subsequent to the time of the Apos- 
tles, and that too against both Apostolic precept and 
Apostolic practice, how is it that in about a hundred and 
fifty years after the Apostles, sixty-six Bishops should be 
summoned from their various dioceses, to sit in judgment 
upon the comparatively insignificant question, whether or 
not a child should be baptized before it was eight days 
old ; and yet nobody, in that large and learned assembly 
of Bishops, so far as we are informed, should raise any 
question as to the infinitely more important fact, whether 
children should be baptized at all ? If infant baptism had 
been a new thing — an innovation, — a heresy, how came 
it about that in this purest age of Christianity, when every 
error on its very first appearance was quickly noticed and 
stoutly resisted, this false doctrine should have become so 
general, that it had found its way into the districts of at 
least sixty- six Bishops, not one of whom raised a ques- 
tion, whether infants should be baptized, in a council 
called expressly to consider a matter pertaining to the 
subject of infant baptism ? At this early period of the 
Church, errors did not spread so rapidly, nor so power- 
fully as to silence every orthodox tongue, and at length 
to be universally admitted and practised, without awaking 
opposition or arousing controversy. 



I. (Page 66.) 

M A learned Rabbi tells us that Ezra composed eighteen 
forms of prayer, which were enjoined by the Great Coun- 
cil, that every man might have them in his mouth ; " to 
which he adds a statement of the custom which prevailed, 
that the people should say "Amen" These eighteen 



NOTES. 



99 



prayers may be found in " Prideaux's Connections." — 
Kip's Double Witness, 

In Home's Introduction, Yol. III., may be found the 
following extract from the Jewish Liturgy, with which 
our Saviour was familiar, and from which He mainly took 
the petitions embodied in the form which He gave to His 
disciples : " Our Father, which art in heaven, be gracious 
unto us, O Lord, our God ; hallowed be Thy name, and 
let the remembrance of Thee be glorified in heaven above, 
and upon earth here below. Let Thy kingdom reign 
over us now and forever. The holy men of old said, re- 
mit and forgive unto all men, whatsoever they have done 
against Me. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver 
us from the evil thing. For Thine is the kingdom, and 
Thou shalt reign in glory forever and for evermore." 

K. (Page 68.) 

Before the Reformation, the Liturgy was only in Latin> 
and was much the same as the present Roman breviary 
and missal. One of the fruits of the Reformation was the 
purging of the Liturgy of corrupt innovations, and its 
translation into English. " Edward YI. appointed the 
Archbishop of Canterbury, with other learned and dis- 
creet Bishops and Divines, to draw an order of divine 
worship, having respect to the pure religion of Christ, 
taught in the Scripture, and to the practice of the Primi- 
tive Church." It was the wish of Cranmer and his asso- 
ciates to retain whatever was sanctioned by Scripture and 
primitive usage, and to reject nothing but what savored 
of superstition or tended to errors in doctrine and wor- 
ship. Many of the collects retained by them, and which 
now make a part of our Prayer Book, have been used in 
the public worship of the Church, for fifteen hundred 
years. ^ The English Prayer Book, substantially as it now 
is, having been ratified by Convocation and by an Act of 
Parliament, was used for the first time, by authority, in 
all the Churches on Whit- Sunday, 1549. 

The Prayer Book of the Protestant Episcopal Church 
in the United States was ratified by the General Conven' 
9 * 

LOFC 



100 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



tion, in October, 1789, and does not differ essentially from 
that of the Church, of England. 

The services for Festivals and Fasts, which are pro- 
vided in the Prayer Book, are happily adapted to the ne- 
cessities of our spiritual nature, and are founded upon 
the authority of Holy Scripture. Festivals and Fasts 
were enjoined by God upon the Jews, and were observed 
by our Lord and His Apostles. Their necessity has been 
acknowledged by those bodies of Christians, who, in their 
haste to depart, apparently as far as possible from the 
Church, undertook to do without them. Thus our Puri- 
tan Fathers made it penal to observe Christmas, but or- 
dained a Festival in the Autumn, in the form of a Thanks- 
giving Day. They would not keep the fast of Lent, but 
they set apart a day in the Spring, as a 4 4 day of fasting, 
humiliation, and prayer." 

The Church has, from the early ages, observed a fast of 
forty days, wherein the ordinary means of grace were 
used, after an extraordinary manner. Those bodies of 
Christians who discard this practice, have felt the neces- 
sity of such a season, and have virtually confessed it, in 
that species of substitute found in their "four days' meet- 
ings*' or 4 4 protracted meetings," and other extraordinary 
services, connected, commonly, with what are known as 
modern 44 revivals." We think their own experience is 
proving that the 44 old paths " are the better way. 



L. (Page 79.) 

The office of 4 4 the Church of the Living God, as the 
pillar and ground of the truth," is not only to spread that 
truth, but to conserve it. This, the Protestant Episcopal 
Church does, not only by retaining an Apostolic ministry, 
but by embodying the great principles of the Gospel, in 
an Evangelical Liturgy. If the minister go astray and be- 
come heretical, he cannot easily carry the people with 
him. Nor can he continue to preach after he ceases to 
believe in the Divinity of Christ. He must quit the 
Church at once when he quits the faith, since he cannot 
preach without using the Liturgy, and he cannot do that, 
after he ceases to believe that Christ is a Divine Being. 



NOTES. 



101 



In this manner are the people protected against the errors 
into which their minister may fall. 

It has been shown in the sermon that a Liturgy has al- 
ways obtained in the Church, in connection with an Apos- 
tolic ministry ; that these were universal for fifteen hun- 
dred years, and that, at the present day, of the two hun- 
dred millions of Christians, one hundred and eighty retain 
the three orders of the ministry and a Liturgy. Heresies 
have appeared from time to time in the Church. This was 
foretold by the Saviour and the Apostles. Christ prom- 
ised to be with His Church, and that " the gates of hell 
should not prevail against it." This promise has been 
fulfilled : — ■ they have not prevailed against it. It is a 
remarkable fact, that of the one hundred and eighty mil- 
lions who retain the Apostolic ministry, of Bishops, Priests, 
and Deacons, there is not, to my knowledge, a single con- 
gregation who deny the Divinity of Christ. 

There is another fact in this connection hardly less re- 
markable. The great work of the Reformation com- 
menced about the same time in England and on the Con* 
tinent. In England, the Church was content to cut off 
what was corrupt, to reform what had been abused, and 
to preserve what was believed to be Apostolic, The Ger- 
man reformers also cut off what was corrupt, and reformed 
what had been abused, but they went one step further : — 
they rejected Episcopacy, — because the Church of Rome 
pretended the supremacy of the Bishop of Rome, and had 
otherwise corrupted the three-fold ministry. Here then 
was a great experiment. Here were two Reformed 
Churches : the one holding to an Apostolic Ministry, the 
other rejecting it. In other respects, there was no essential 
difference between them. Now, after three hundred years, 
what is the result ? There stands the. English Church 
with her twenty thousand Clergymen, and her Missionaries 
in every land ; the very bulwark of Protestant Christen- 
dom, maintaining " the faith once delivered to the saints." 

AVhat has become of her who, three hundred years ago, 
claimed to be a sister, but undertook to put asunder what 
Apostles had joined together ? "Where is the faith in- 
trusted to her ? She thought it wise to attempt to main- 
tain the Apostolic faith without the Apostolic ministry — 
thus substituting a plan of her own for the plan of the 



102 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



Apostles ; and where is she now, and what does she 
teach ? At the beginning of the present century a " ma- 
jority of the divines of the German Churches rejected all 
belief in the Divine Origin of Christianity/' Says an 
American traveller: "The majority of the Professors 
in the Universities disbelieve the Revelation of the Old 
Testament, and regard its authority with no more rever- 
ence than that of the Iliad or JEneid" " The Miracles 
of the Old, and often those of the New Testament, are ex- 
plained away in conversation and in their lecture rooms ; 
and the inspiration of the Apostles, and sometimes of 
Christ, publicly denied" " On the subject of the New 
Testament, there is also the greatest diversity of opinion, 
though the majority of the Professors, in every depart- 
ment, unite in "disbelieving it." The same writer adds : 
" I believe I am within the bounds of truth in asserting, 
that there are not five Orthodox Professors and Clergy- 
men in Germany, who esteem the Sabbath in any other 
light than as a Mosaic Institution." Of the practical ef- 
fects of such teaching the reader can judge for himself. — 
See Richardson's Reasons — Stuart's Letters to Channing 
— Dwighfs Travels in Germany —~ Rose's State of Protes- 
tantism in Germany — Robinson's Bib, Rep., Vol. I. 

After the Reformation, in England, another experiment 
was made. The Puritans came forth from the Church of 
England. They had the Apostolic faith as held by that 
Church. They were at that time truly Orthodox as to the 
articles of their belief. But they undertook to maintain 
that faith without the Apostolic Ministry, and without 
the aid of a Liturgy. They landed upon these shores and 
planted the Banner of the Cross in the new world, to be 
carried forth by an army, without divinely commissioned 
officers. What has been the result ? In about two hun- 
dred years the great body of their churches denied " the 
Lord that bought them." The very Church at Plymouth, 
which they planted, departed from the faith, There was 
a time, when there was but a solitary Congregational par- 
ish, in the city of Boston, that was Orthodox. The very 
University, which Pilgrim hands planted, and Pilgrim piety 
endowed, became the hot-bed of heresy. And where U 
the Church of England ? Just where she was three hun 



NOTES. 



103 



dred years ago : firmly holding " the faith once delivered 
to the saints." I know it is sometimes said, that the 
King's Chapel, Boston, was the first Episcopal Church 
which became Unitarian. I aver that no Episcopal Church 
in this country ever did become Unitarian. The " King's 
Chapel " was once an Episcopal Church. When the Rev- 
olutionary war broke out, the minister and many of his 
people, who were loyalists, left the country. It was used, 
for a while, by the "Old South" Congregation. The 
property of the former proprietors, who were loyalists, 
was confiscated. The pews fell into the hands of other 
people. After peace was declared, a Mr. Freeman ap- 
plied to Bishop White for ordination, at the same time 
avowing his Unitarian sentiments. Bishop WTiite could 
not ordain him, and would not, if he could — because he 
was a heretic. What did the people do ? They had a 
meeting of the congregation. They set apart and ordained 
two of their number as Deacons, — who, in their turn, 
laid their hands upon Mr. Freeman's head, and he then 
and there, and thereby, becomes their minister. He, in 
his turn, takes the Prayer Book and riddles it of its vitals, 
and proceeds with his ministrations. Thus it will be 
seen, that the "King's Chapel" did not become a Unita- 
rian place of worship until it became a Congregational 
parish. All there is Episcopal about it, are the walls, 
furniture, and the skeleton of a mutilated Prayer Book. 

The Church is the conservator of the i ' Truth " in anoth- 
er relation. On the opposite side stands the Church of 
Rome, clothed with great power, and covered with deep 
corruption. She boasts of her authority — and in a con- 
troversy with her, the various denominations invariably 
come off second best. They unwittingly attack her at a 
point where she is strongest and they are weakest. On the 
other hand, when she tells us that she has an Apostolic 
commission from Christ, through His Apostles, we an- 
swer : "So have ice." And we follow up this answer by 
saying, that we have every thing that she ever had, in the 
first three centuries ; and the difference between us lies, 
only in those unscriptural doctrines, and practices, which 
have been added since. What she holds as articles of 
taith that we do not, are heresies^ and we can tell her the 



104 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



time and the place when and where she adopted them. 
Thus our great advantages in the controversy with Rome, 
must be manifest to all, who understand what that con- 
troversy is. 

M. (Page 82.) 

By Confirmation, we mean the rite of laying on of hands 
upon the heads of those who have been baptized, and 
which is represented by St. Paul as <4 a principle of the 
doctrine of Christ." — Heb. vi. 2. 

"When Philip went down to Samaria and preached, 
many believed, and were baptized by him. As soon as 
the Apostles at Jerusalem heard of this event, Peter and 
John went to Samaria, and laid their hands upon these 
baptized persons. — Acts viii. 15-17. So also at Ephe- 
sus, St. Paul laid his hands on those who had been bap- 
tized. — Acts xix. 6. 

In the Apostolic age the rite was usually denominated 
"the laying on of hands ; " it is now commonly termed 
" confirmation," inasmuch as the person who receives this 
laying on of hands, thereby ratifies and confirms his bap- 
tismal vows. It is a profession of his faith before the 
world. The propriety of such a ceremony must be appar- 
ent. That it is Apostolic, there is no dispute. Of its 
fitness and profit, there are multitudes of witnesses. As 
none but Apostles performed this rite, so its administra- 
tion is restricted to their successors, the Bishops of the 
church. Calvin himself acknowledged that it was prac- 
tised by the Apostles. In his fourth book of Institutes, 
he says : "It was an ancient custom, that the children of 
Christian parents, when they were grown up, should be 
presented to the Bishop to do that office, which was re- 
quired of persons who were baptized at adult age." . . . . 
" Such an imposition of hands as this, which is used 
purely as a blessing, I very much approve of, and wish it 
were now restored to its pure and primitive uses." 

The following testimony is an extract from the " Report 
of a Committee of the General Assembly of the Presbyte- 
rian Church." " It appears," say they, " that a rite called 
Confirmation was administered by the imposition of the 
hands of the minister, or bishop, or elder, together with 



NOTES. 



105 



prayer, on baptized children at a certain age." And after 
quoting the authority of Calvin and others, the committee 
add: "This rite of Confirmation, thus administered to 
baptized children when arrived to competent years, and 
previously instructed and prepared for it, with the express 
view of their admission to the Lord's Supper, shows 
clearly that the primitive Church, in her purest days, ex- 
ercised the authority of a mother over her baptized chil- 
dren." — Bishop Hobart's Tract on Confirmation. 

The following is from the " Confession of Faith," 
adopted by a Baptist Association, which met in Philadel- 
phia, Sept. 25, 1742 : — 

" We believe that laying on of hands, (with prayer,) 
upon baptized persons as such, is an ordinance of Christ, 
and ought to be submitted unto by all such persons that 
are admitted to partake of the Lord's Supper, and that 
the end of the ordinances is not the extraordinary gifts of 
the Spirit, but for the further reception of the Holy Spirit 
of promise, or for the addition of the graces of the Spirit, 
and the influence thereof, to confirm, strengthen, and com- 
fort them in Christ Jesus ; it being ratified and established 
by the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, in the primitive 
times, to abide in the Church, as meeting together on the 
first day of the week was, that being the day of worship 
or Christian Sabbath under the Gospel, and as preaching 
the Word was, and as Baptism was, and Prayer was, and 
singing of Psalms, etc., etc., was, and so this of laying on 
of hands was. For as the whole Gospel was confirmed 
by signs, and wonders, and divers miracles, and gifts of 
the Holy Ghost in general, so was every ordinance in like 
manner confirmed in particular." 

In the Episcopal Church the candidate for Baptism, (if 
an adult,) for Confirmation and the Lord's Supper, is ex- 
amined by the Minister, and by him admitted to these 
privileges, if , in his opinion, the candidate be a proper 
subject for them. The "keys" were committed to the 
Apostle, and not to the people. The commission from 
Christ authorizes and directs his Minister to baptize, and 
no earthly power can interpose in this matter. A Minis- 
ter has no moral right to allow laymen to say whom he 
shall baptize and admit to the Lord's Supper, and whom 
he shall not. Sheep are not, commonly, shepherds. 



106 WHY I AM A CHURCHMAN. 



N. (Page 86.) 

Any person in this diocese may prefer a complaint 
against a clergyman to the Standing Committee of the di- 
ocese, who, after having made a preliminary examination, 
may, at their discretion, present such clergyman to the 
Bishop for trial, in which case they are required to make 
charges and specifications in writing, in the form of a pre- 
sentment, which presentment is sent to the Bishop, who 
is required to serve a copy of the same on the accused, 
with a list of nine Presbyters, from which the accused 
shall select five, and return the same to the Bishop. The 
court thus constituted meet at sunh time and place as the 
Bishop may appoint. The court declare their decision in 
writing, together with the sentence, if the accused be 
found guilty. The sentence is pronounced publicly by 
the Bishop, in some Church, in the presence of three Pres- 
byters. If the sentence be deposition from the ministry, 
it is immediately communicated to the Bishops of the sev- 
eral dioceses. 

O. (Page 24.) 

The Danes were the means of first bringing the Church 
of Ireland under the sceptre of the Bishop of Rome. 
1 4 Their second Archbishop of Dublin, A. D. 1074, was 
the first person who acknowledged subjection in spiritual 
matters, to any but an Irish Primate. The first assertion 
of the Pope's supremacy, as extending to Ireland, was 
made bv Pope Gregory VTL, A. D. 1074. The first 
Romish "Legate for Ireland, was Gilbert, Bishop of the 
Danes, in Limerick, A. D. 1106. The first Irish Synod, 
at which a Papal Legate presided, was that of Rathbreasil 
in A. D. 1118." " The history of the Irish Church 
shows clearly that it was independent of Rome till the 
twelfth century." 



LEJa'IO 




r 



